Tales from the Abridgement
by ToonGuy
Summary: In between the filming of the TV show and fighting off the coming of a great evil, what is it exactly that the engines on the Island of Sodor do in the moments between? If you guessed what they do in the normal episodes, then you'd be correct! Has minor bad language, maybe a little more as time goes on. May contain small amount of shippings. Maybe not. Haven't decided yet.
1. In Which No One Gets to Sleep

Hello all you wonderful people! I imagine that you've clicked on this wondering what the hell is ToonGuy doing at the moment? Shouldn't he be doing something of actual substance!? Well, none of you are probably thinking that, and I don't blame you, but I've decided that I need to refresh myself somewhat. Doing Thomas Abridged is a bunch of fun, but I also am aware that I'm kind of entering dangerous territory of a sort. It's rare that any fanfiction enters the eighty chapter bracket, especially in this fandom, and I fear that I may risk alienating some of you fine people if I continue without a little break.

So, this break is something to keep my brain active, and hopefully continue to entertain you at the same time. I'm going to be writing a bunch of original stories set in the same universe as Thomas Abridged, just to focus on goofy, silly stuff. Nothing serious here! These can take place at any time, any place, and yes, that does include in seasons following the one I am currently on. Think of this as a test run for some of the characters that I haven't gotten to yet. This one is set Season 9-11, some time in there.

I hope you enjoy!

...

"I still say we should watch Patriot Games-"

"You always say we should watch Patriot Games! I say we watch 12 Angry Men!"

"Booooorrring!"

"It is not boring, it is a classic example of a courtroom drama and paints a very interesting picture of moral ambiguity!"

This argument had been droning on since all of the engines had arrived back at Tidmouth in the late afternoon. Percy had been lucky enough not to have to take the mail train that night, and had taken most of his medication, so Henry had seen nothing to indicate why simply asking "Which movie do you want to watch tonight?" would lead to...well, this.

Oh how foolish he had been.

The main stirrers of the argument were Thomas (Patriot Games) and Gordon (12 Angry Men) which was not surprising in the least, really. Gordon only wanted to watch 12 Angry Men because he thought that it made him look more highbrow, and Thomas only wanted to watch Patriot Games because he wanted to make Gordon cross. It was a vicious cycle where neither wanted to back down and recant.

Eventually, Edward angrily intervened and suggested that they watch Get Carter instead. He was immediately shouted down by both engines, and had then turned back to his attempt at reading Harry Potter with the very clear thought in his mind being 'never again'.

It was around about the point where James and Percy took sides respectively, when there was a rather loud and painful humming noise. Everyone looked around for a moment, and Edward vaguely hoped that the Rapture had finally come. Then, there was a bang, and a splutter and a slow dying whining noise. Then the lights went out, the doors slammed shut and the engines were left in near total darkness, save for a brief sliver of moonlight through cracks in the roof.

"Balls" muttered Henry. "Power's gone out in the generator."

"So how come the doors are shut?"

"Apparently the Fat Controller didn't want us getting any ideas of escaping this hellhole. Someone's installed electrics in the wood as well. We're locked in."

"Oh. Terrific!" fumed James.

Edward sighed, and closed his eyes. He had slept in darker spots before, and he was pretty confident that he could get himself to fall asleep within at least ten minutes, if not less time. So they wouldn't watch a movie tonight. So what?

There was a loud wail from the other side of the sheds, and Edward's eyes snapped open. "WAH!?" He said, his mind having yet to catch up to his tongue. "What's happening?!"

"Emily's MP3 ran out of juice." dully noted Henry.

"Oh, sweet Sally Ann, I thought it was serious!"

"It is!" Emily insisted, her Scottish brogue becoming increasingly stronger. "I cannae get ta sleep without mah music!"

"And I simply refuse to sleep! I have yet to put on any of my new paint yet!" James declared as flamboyantly as ever.

Gordon grunted. "All of you can go hang, quite frankly. I have important work tomorrow! I shall be pulling the express once more, and my passengers shall be requiring a brave and bold stallion of the line! A champion of speed and vigor and other such words! They shall need someone who is fastest! And the best! To pull the express!"

"Yeah, it's a pity they'll have to settle for you." Thomas laughed as Gordon attempted to lunge towards him. "What the hell do you think that's going to do?!"

"I WILL END YOU!"

"It occurs to me-" Henry spoke up, in a attempt to be diplomatic "-that none of us are going to get to sleep the way we wanted to tonight. So, why don't we just do something to help the time pass?"

"That's a good idea." agreed Edward. "All right...anyone got any ideas?"

No one spoke for a minute. Then at last, Percy spoke up. "How about I Spy?"

James rolled his eyes. "Oh yes, that's brilliant! I spy with my little eye something beginning with E!"

"Engine?"

"Excellent, well that was fun! What do you want to play next? Hide and go seek!?"

"There's no need to get uppity with me!"

"All right!" thundered Edward. "How about we play a game of Twenty Questions?"

"Fine!" Emily grinned. "I dare ye to beat me at this game!"

"Oh, we will, Miss Haggis!"

"Miss Haggis? James, ye are losing yer touch with tha insults!" Emily's smirk was growing dangerously close to hitting a Eight on the 'James Level of Smugness' meter, so Edward hurriedly started.

"Got one?"

"Yes, and does that count as a question?"

"No. ...Okay, first question. Is this a person?"

"Yes."

"Famous?" asked Percy.

"...Yes."

"Man or woman?" Thomas asked the question this time.

"Woman."

"She British?"

"Yes, James."

"...Is she Maggie Smith?" Emily laughed, and Thomas grinned. "Ha! You're so predictable, Ems!" Emily stuck her tongue out at the cheeky little tank engine, and Edward relaxed a bit. Maybe things weren't going to- He mentally slapped himself. You never said that, or even thought it, full out. Because that was asking for trouble. He snapped back in time to hear Henry ask the first question, whether or not Thomas's pick was a person. Thomas answered positive, and so it went on.

They got to ten questions, having established that this person was male, was relatively famous, but not as famous as Maggie Smith, was British, was a decent runner, was a fan of the color blue, was a star in both a television show and a movie based off of said show and that finally, he had a probably more famous brother that outclassed him a great deal.

Many were stumped by this. But at last, Percy spoke up. "Is it Gordon?"

Gordon roared, and lunged across the berths. Thomas jumped back out of fright, forgetting any smart remarks in the panic of nearly having his life extinguished by the mad blue bull. It was only thanks to James and Henry holding Gordon back that Thomas wasn't a smear on the floor.

Edward hurriedly suggested another game.

...

As Hour 4 of the night crept up upon the seven engines, battle lines appeared to have been drawn.

Edward and Henry had attempted to calm the mood down with a rousing sing song. That had failed when someone had thrown a boot through the window, smacking James in the face, which rather ruined the experience. Then, Gordon had suggested playing 'Never Have I', which had got them through the rest of Hour 2 and a bit of Hour 3, before Henry accidentally managed to offend James, somehow (Edward still wasn't sure how. James was just very easily offended) and that had been scuppered.

So now, they were sitting in grim silence. Edward was gazing at the clock, willing it to go faster, somehow, anyway possible. Henry was focusing his mind on something more pleasant, like knitting patterns, or perhaps defusing mines in a war torn part of the Middle East somewhere. James and Gordon were coolly plotting their revenge on Thomas, while the latter and Percy were busy planning their revenge on Gordon. It was a nice circle of vengeance. Emily was trying to will herself to sleep.

And thus it would have continued if not for certain events. Hour 4 came and went, as did Hour 5. They were now into the next day.

It was as Hour 5 drew to a close, and as Hour 6 began slowly creeping up upon them, that yet another cherry was added to the very wobbly cake that was being baked by a blind person with knives for hands. The silence had done well, for the most part, in lulling many of the engines to near sleep. Edward, in particular, was now on the very verge of letting his eyelids close for the last time, and finally getting a bit of kip.

It was then that the rain began. At first, it merely hit the roof as it always did. It didn't hurt their chances of sleeping. In fact, it almost increased them. A nice, steady rhythm to help them fall to sleep too. Besides, this was usually happened around this time anyway.

A single drop of water eased it's way through the cracks of the tiles, through the materials that insulated the sheds and slowly dangled just on the edge of falling down to the floor. Then it fell, hitting the ground with a soft 'plip'.

Then another came.

And another.

And another.

This was okay for the next few hours...or possibly, it wasn't. At this point, Edward was so utterly exhausted that the concept of time began to lose a great deal of meaning. But eventually, whatever the case, it began to drive the engines a little mad. No one could do anything to stop it, no more than they could force the moon to set a few hours earlier. So they just had to sit there and take this Chinese Water Torture. The difference being, of course, that usually these people who were tortured thusly, would usually give in after a period of at least a few days.

James lasted two hours.

"DEAR GOD!" He screamed, awakening Edward, and rushed to the door and began banging on it loudly.

"James." remarked Percy, wearily.

"LET! ME! OUT!"

"James!" growled Emily, a warning very clearly in her voice.

"I CAN'T TAKE IT ANY MORE! I'M AS MAD AS HELL AND I CAN'T TAKE IT ANY MORE!"

"JAMES!" screamed Edward, losing any sense of composure he might have had. "SHUT THE HELL UP!"

James glowered at him. Edward was on the verge of just crawling across the shed and ripping James's eyes out with his teeth. it honestly wouldn't have mattered at this point, considering how well the night was going.

After that, there was a little bit of peace (Albeit one where most of the parties in question were furiously trying to work out how to kill the others in a painful way that couldn't be traced back to them) that allowed Edward to finally fall into sleep.

For three seconds.

With only a brief warning hum, the lights suddenly slammed back on, blinding all seven engines and causing a great deal of commotion as Edward briefly panicked and thought someone had finally launched a nuclear strike against the country, and Gordon, Henry and James launched a vicious attack upon the tank engines, leaving Emily to struggle out of the newly opened door, right into the turntable well.

And then the roof decided that it had had enough of this fare, and decided to collapse in upon the engines in the vain hope that maybe this would stop them bickering.

...

The next morning, as both Harvey and the Breakdown Train continued to clear away the mess, Toby and the Fat Controller stared at the chaos with complete bafflement. James had been dragged from the shed first, mostly hysterical over the fact that his paintwork had been badly dented during the 'fight' and had demanded to be rushed to the Works straight away. The two other main tender engines were barely better. Henry had gotten lucky and escaped with only a cut lip and a bit of wounded pride (And tender, part of the support beam had come down on top of him as well) but Gordon looked as though he had been through the war. He wouldn't say who won between him and Thomas, but it was pretty clear that both had probably lost.

Thomas was also looking worse for wear. Not because of Gordon's attacks, however. He had made the mistake of calling Henry a tree hugger one too many times, and had been uppercutted somehow into the corner of the shed, before falling face first down onto the rails. No one was quite sure how Henry had managed to uppercut Thomas, or even how engines could even punch with their buffers. Percy and Emily, meanwhile, were getting their faces examined by medical personal after the incident in the turntable well. Percy wasn't even sure how he'd landed in the well.

And then there was Edward. He looked as though he had gone twelve rounds with Ali with both hands tied behind his back. Most of the roof had chosen to fall onto him, because the luck of the Edward still eluded him. He also appeared to have the reddest eyes any engine doctor had ever seen, as a result of not getting even ten seconds of sleep that night.

"Sir?" he asked politely, or as politely as he could with his new speech impediment, a result of biting down on his tongue when the rubble had hit him "I'd suggest that we be separated for tonight...we're all a little raw."

"Er...yes, Edward. I...suppose so." Hatt blinked once, and then turned to Toby, who had one thing to say.

"On the other hand, perhaps not giving me a shed with the others wasn't such a bad idea, sir."


	2. In Which A Dinner Party Is Held

**This was a rather hard one to decide upon. Originally the plan was to write up about the 'Comedy Night with Billy and Charlie' I mention below, but that fell through when I couldn't think of a really satisfactory ending. So this sort of came about. It's also a two parter, I'll do that occasionally, just for maximum laughs and to recharge my batteries. So yes, hope you enjoy.**

...

"What are you waiting for?"

"Death."

"..."

"Oh, right now? This party to end. Though the way it's going, the two are not entirely mutually exclusive."

"Oh, hush, you."

Emily and Henry looked at the clock. 5:30. Another four hours to go.

Every railway has it's own quaint little rituals that it went through every so often. Well, if you replaced the word quaint with frustrating. Once every month or so, the tank engines across the Island (save for those on narrow gauge) were locked into the Shunting Yards behind Knapford and forced to endure a entire night's worth of awful puns and rather inappropiately racist remarks from Charlie and Billy respectively. Cameras were set up to make sure no one sneaked in or out who wasn't required to. If the engines managed to make it through the night without cracking and rushing for the nearest shed, they were rewarded a day's holiday in which to relax, go drinking, sleep in the sheds, anything they really wanted.

While this was going on, the tender engines had this one night to make like it was the last day of their lives and do whatever the hell they wanted this ranged from the mild (Edward always went for a evening in a sound proof shed with a fine wine) to the confusing (Every year, on the dot, Connor ordered a great deal of butter in an attempt to make him go faster, in his own words) to the extreme (James temporarily declaring himself President of Sodor and demanding every single bit of beautification products be given to him). Usually the Fat Controller ended up wondering why he even bothered.

But if the tank engines won, that meant that the tender engines lost. And so, they were given a fate even worse than that of Comedy Hour at the Shunting Yards.

They were put into the yards at Wellsworth, and were forced to endure a painfully long night listening to the speech maker (James) in a specially chosen decor (Chosen by James), eat food and drink catered to the host's taste (James's tastes) and listen to long, long speeches from the host (James's speeches were often considered to be the final great hurdle Buddhists had to overcome before reaching enlightenment. Few ever managed to endure them) as music played that would make Terrance the Tractor lose his smile.

In the corner of the yards, Edward was staring in horror at the variety of directions, which included a neon pink coloration of the back end of the station, a banner that read 'Come All Ye Less Fabulous' stretched across the yard and a very large, very bright disco ball that occasionally blinded the engines. "My god." he breathed "I would have taken on Diesel 10 five times over if I knew I never had to do this again."

"I-I-It's probably not th-that bad, in the l-long run." awkwardly lied Molly.

"That paint is luminous! Like hell that's going to come off in the morning."

"H-H-Have you tried a c-c-c-cocktail?" Molly smiled sheepishly. "It's, er, rather s-s-strong."

Edward had a sip. His face turned the color of fermented turnips and almost vomited up the many little sausages on a stick that were burning in his fire. "Dear god in heaven! It's like tasting liquid magma!"

James was none too happy either. Not least because he had been denied anything that would allow him to have actual fun, and he was aware that at the end of the night, everyone would get their revenge on him by pouring a large mixture of coal dust, quarry dust and wet fish over him. It was a unique revenge created especially for him, and he was aware that there were many who were growing rather restless already.

"I swear to the heavens, if we weren't trapped in here-"

"Calm down, Connor, ye'll give yeself a heart attack." Murdoch looked around grimly. "Ach, but why can we not have some peace and quiet? Too much noise."

"Well, on the plus side, I can see our host looks rather well." muttered Neville, as James swaggered about, trying to ignore the hostile glares he was getting from nearly everyone around him. "If he ends up dead, I'm not going to be surprised in the least."

"How did Stephen get out of this?" Connor asked.

"There was a bit of debate as to what kind of engine he was, and to save annoying him, they decided to let him off the hook. Lucky son of a gun." Hank grinned down at the others "Howdy fellas. Mind if I join y'all for a bit of a drink?"

"Uh...sure, Sheriff Woody, whatever you say?" Neville began backing away very quickly as Hank and Murdoch began to try and out-drink the other.

Gordon wasn't doing too hot either. Caitlin had idled off a moment ago, much to his embarrassment, as he had actually been hoping to impress Henry and James with the fact that his 'special friend' actually seemed into him. But no, she was with Emily now, probably complaining about him. He seethed crossly as Hiro backed down next to him. "I have had it up to here, Hiro!"

"I understand, Gordon, more than you know. But I fear it is not likely that our views will be listened too. I have tried talking our 'host' out of making a 'speech' but he is adamant that he will go ahead."

"If he doesn't end up murdered by the end of the night, I will have lost my faith in enginekind."

"You had faith?"

"Don't get mouthy with me, Hiro. We're just lucky that Spencer isn't here-"

"HELLO LADIES AND GENTLEMEN!"

"OH CRIKEY!" Gordon backed down fast and hid in the shed. "Don't let him see me!"

Spencer steamed off the turntable, wearing a feather boa and with a very large top hat. "I have been requested to say a little something before our illustrious host gets up and ruins the whole evening for us! A-ha-ha, a-ha-ha!" His laugh grated into everyone's ears as they took their places reluctantly. James stood besides Spencer, smirking. This was his cunning plan, to let Spencer take the heat and the punishment while he slipped away and hid in the nearest hairdressers.

"Can't believe we have to listen to this. For a 'fast' engine, he sure knows how to drag it out, doesn't he, Emily?" Caitlin got a knowing nod in return. They watched as Donald and Douglas began openly singing aloud "Auld Lang Syne" like their lives depended on it. They probably did.

"I wonder what the others are doing at this moment." Henry murmured as he drew level with Molly and Edward.

...

Elsewhere, at the Search and Rescue Centre, Rosie tipped back her seventh bottle of shandy and drunkenly giggled at Belle, who was looking a little red in the face after only her fourth. "Aye, y'know...y'know sommut, Belle?"

"Er, know lot of things, Rose."

"You're my bezzie mate!"

"Awww, You're my bezzie mate too!" Belle hiccuped loudly. "I'm so glad I got to- HIC -spend the day with you while the others do most of the actual work- HIC!"

"Ah, who needs boys anyway!? Girls just wanna have fun!"

...

At Tidmouth, Toby laughed maniacally as the other engines banged on the doors.

"Come on Toby, let us in, it's freezing!"

"Yeah, I really don't want to have to use the old sheds at Ffarquhar! They smell!"

"This is the one night I get to actually have a berth at Tidmouth, and you're not taking that from me! It's mine, all mine! Mwhahahahaha!"

"Toby, how much did you have to drink?"

"Can it, Henrietta."

...

"Whatever it is, it's bound to be more fun than what we're having right now." dourly noted Edward. Molly too looked gloomy, as Spencer continued onwards. With a flourish, he tossed his face back like he was trying to whip his hair out of sight, only for his boa to be sent flying.

There was a loud crack, a scream and suddenly the disco lights went into overdrive. The collective "Ooohs!" and "Aaahs! and "Get it out of my eyes!" filled the yard and the town beyond.

At last, with a great deal of effort, someone managed to reach the variety of switches on the wall that controlled the electricity, and with a wild sweep of their buffers, turned the lights back on.

"Thank you, whoever that was!" Caitlin blinked a couple of times to try and regain some sight. The first thing she saw with this newly returned vision was...James, lying on the ground, moving not a inch and with a strange, sticky looking substance pooling underneath him.

It was fair to say that for the next three minutes, there was complete pandemonium.

"Faire taire, mesdames et messieurs!"

Everyone blinked, and turned to see a rather unfamiliar engine standing there. Well, to most of the engines, he was unfamiliar. Gordon only groaned. "Oh dear god in heaven, Axel, what are you doing here?"

"Ah, it is lucky I happened to be, how you say it, in the neighborhood, n'cest pas?"

"Who is this? I don't believe we've been introduced."

"This, Neville, is Axel. He was the Belgian representative on the Great Railway Show. He's...out there, shall we say?" Edward looked at James. "Is he dead? Someone should check."

"Can't see any drivers around, no fireman either. They've probably all gone home and are enjoying themselves right now." Henry moaned. "Selfish gits!" Axel whistled loudly to get his attention.

"I do believe that we have on our buffers a crime so serious, so depraved, that I have decided to step in and solve this...this-" Suddenly, a random piano started playing what was attempting to be dramatic music, as Axel's face twisted into a face so hammy that Brian Blessed would feel threatened "- **MMMMURDER**!"

There was a rather stunned silence following this.

"Well-" said Edward at last, as he finally recovered control of his tongue. "-I mean, are we really sure he's dead?"

"There was a gunshot, man! I don't know where you come from, but that and the body seems to indicate that it's a strong probability!" Conner rolled his eyes, and muttered to Neville under his breath. "I think his brain is going."

Edward snarled, and would have made a lewd comment about Conner had not Axel immediately rolled forward and let loose a sharp blast on his whistle. "Ladies and gentlemen, please! Arguing will get us nowhere! We must find the culprit before he strikes again, and strike again he will! So, let the **MMMMMURDER** investigation begin!"

"Do you have to always say it like that?" Gordon looked to the side. "Wonder what the others are doing right now?"

...

"Quick! Huwwy up with that tunnel!"

Stanley frowned as more wooden boards were passed to Whiff and his crew. "I don't really get why it is we're still boarding up the tunnel to Misty Island. I mean, we all know they're still not there!"

"It doesn't do any harm!" Stafford snapped, before detonating the seventh explosive of the night just to make sure there was no concievable way to reach THAT PLACE without resorting to boat.

 **TO BE CONTINUED.**


	3. In Which There is A Anti-Climax

"This is humiliating!" fumed Henry as Axel hemmed and hawed a great deal over James's prone body (Few thought James was dead. They all assumed that James was practically immortal. It certainly felt that way sometimes) and made odd little comments.

"Henry, we're all trapped here with some mad Belgian engine, James is potentially dead and Spencer seems to have gone into a complete and utter nervous breakdown. The amount of embarrassment you feel is very low in the grand scale of important things." Conner sighed as he shifted away from the remains of a balloon. "Now, what I wouldn't give for a way out of here."

"That sounds like something a **MURDERER** WOULD SAY!" shouted Axel, swooping down like a golden eagle upon Conner. "Are you a murderer, mousier!?"

"No! No I'm not-"

"That-" said Axel gravely "-is for me to decide."

"Then why ask me?"

"You know-" remarked Molly to Emily "-he has more the Clouseau approach than the Poirot, really."

"Ye're not wrong."

Axel whistled, waking up several disgruntled owls who immediately flew into his face. Great mirth was had as the Belgian struggled for about three minutes to get them out of his face. Someone would have helped him, but it had been a excruciatingly long night thus far, and thus everyone was a little bit tired. When Sudrians got tired, they got louder. And stupider. And...a lot of other things. None of them really positive.

Once Axel had recovered the shreds of his dignity, and sown them back into something that, if you turned your head and squinted, resembled decorum, he turned to the others. "First, I shall need the results of the autopsy!"

The engines looked at each other.

"Well? Hurry, hurry!"

"Problem." remarked Neville calmly.

"Well?"

"We haven't done a autopsy."

"Why not?"

"Because-" said Edward, with something that sounded like patience, but was actually incredibly weariness "-we are engines, we do not have hands to carry out said autopsy. Also, because you're a twa-"

"Enough of that!" Axel muttered something under his breath regarding the English and their incompetency, before turning back on the charm "In which case, I suggest that I interview you all to get to the bottom of this gruesome **MURDER!** Who will go first?"

"Gordon" said every engine not named Gordon. The blue engine growled at them, and then tried desperately to gain some sympathy, but every engine had conveniently found a place to hide away from the mad Belgian.

...

"So, what do ye think happened?"

Edward looked up Emily "That at the very least, I'm not watching Space 1999 right now. Silly people on SBC are re-running it in a marathon."

"Edward..."

"Honestly? I think we're all just blowing this out of proportion a great deal. And- Er, Emily, is Hank okay?"

The big blue and red engines was moaning piteously, a comically oversized bucket covering his face just in case, and a wide variety of bottles of each and every size lying around. Besides him, Murdoch was looking rather smug, even if his eyes were a bit glazed over and he did occasionally sway and nearly knock into Hank like a set of dominos falling.

"They challenged each other to a drinking contest" Neville remarked. "I got out of the way. I felt as though there was going to be murder at the bar...sorry, that was tasteless of me."

"Who won?"

"Who do you think? It's Hank's fault anyway. He should know better than to challenge a Scot to a drinking contest!"

"Aye, tis true." Emily smiled fondly. "I recall my time before I came here. Knew a tug called Big Mac. Ah, but he could put some away, and no mistake!"

"Speaking of Scots, I haven't seen Donald and Douglas around. Last I saw of them, they were singing that song at the top of their lungs. Perhaps-"

"No." Edward shook his head. "No, this isn't murder. In fact, we're not even sure that James is really dead. No, here's what I think we should do-"

"YOU'RE ALL BASTARDS!" Gordon bellowed as he stormed back over to the long lines of trucks, behind which most of the engines were hiding behind. "I mean, you could have said something! Edward, aren't you supposed to be wise, and kind, and all that claptrap?"

"Gordon, wisdom was telling me that throwing you to that mad engine Axel was the kindest thing to be done. If we go by logic, which Axel appears to have left at home, you're the most likely engine to have committed the crime. Really, getting you out of the way means that we can spend just as much time proving your innocence."

"How am I the most likely person?! What about you!? Or Henry?"

"Because if Henry would have done it, we would have known by now. He would have started screaming the second he got blood on his buffers. And it can't be me, because Molly can vouch for me. Right, Mol?"

"Right."

"Right. Anyway, he says that you're up next, Edward."

"Oh frabjous day. Well, I mean, I have heard of worse ways to pass early morning."

"Have you?"

"No, not really" And so saying, Edward puffed off to get 'interrogated' by Axel.

...

"Dig faster, Dougie!"

"Ye dig faster yerself, ye muckle lazybones!" Douglas frowned. "Aye, that reminds me, why is there yon Thumper in here again?"

"Ach, ye cannae ask me that! My guess is that mebbe the crew realized he wasn't much of a use to anyone, so they just...shoved the poor wee bastard in here. I mean, he wasnae the most talkative, was he?"

"Aye, there is that." Douglas looked down at the hole they had made. "So, how do ye reckon we're doing on the escape tunnel?"

Donald peered over "Er, it looks all right, I suppose. But I cannae think anyone should go down it before we've tested it. Right, off ye go."

"Me?! This was yer plan, was it not?"

"Aye. My plan, my command. Back me up on this, Thumper!"

Thumper didn't respond.

"Thumper?" Donald's buffers had locked onto Thumper's back, so he sort of shook the machine about. "Ah."

"What?"

"Don't panic."

"What!?"

"I think Thumper may or may not be dead."

"WHAT?!"

"I mean, I dinnae know what we were expecting."

"WE'RE STANDING NEXT TO A HOLE WITH A CORPSE!"

"...It wouldnae be my first time."

"Donald!"

"What?! Okay, I am sorry that poor Thumper's past it, but-"

"With a DETECTIVE?! RIGHT. OUT. SIDE?"

Donald was silent for a moment, as this sunk in. "I...see how this could be just the tiniest bit misconstrued."

...

When Edward returned from his (rather lightweight, really, mostly because Axel seemed to forget who Edward was several times) interrogation, he found the many engines arguing fiercely amongst themselves. Hank had already left to get his own interrogation out of the way.

"It's all your fault!" shouted Connor, who was nursing a black eye from where a piece of the shed roof had fell off. "You're the one who said that you were surprised there wasn't a murder!"

"I was being DROLL! This is just because I happen to look like a diesel, isn't it?" Neville declared in righteous outrage.

"Och, ye spread rumors ONE time! That's why ye killed James, wasn't it?!"

"That was years ago! And trust me, if I was to kill James, which I HAVEN'T, by the way, I would not hide it. I would shout it to the heavens, and down to the hells! I would tell every police officer on the Island about it, and I would plead guilty, guilty, guilty to every judge that tried my case!"

"Aye, and he'd probably get off with a slap on the buffers!" Murdoch remarked.

...

"So, Mousier, you claim that you were merely drinking with your friend, is that so?"

Hank still looked queasy. "Sure as I'm breathing-" He broke out mid-sentence into a hacking cough that took his breath away for the next minute and a half. As he recovered, he rolled his eyes "Okay, pardner, maybe that was some real bad timing with my remarks, but that goddamn Scot can vouch for me!"

Axel changed tactics. "And pray tell me, in all your travels to America, did you ever find something like-" His driver held up a piece of metal "-THIS?!"

"No."

"Ah." Axel rather deflated. "Neither do I, I just really hoped you'd have a reaction to it."

...

Hank rolled back in, shrugging to the others. "Well, it's mighty likely that Axel is a even bigger idiot that we thought."

"You shock me." grumbled Henry.

Edward glanced around. "So, er, where's Spencer? I haven't seen him in a bit-" He frowned as all the engines stared at him. "What? Did I say something?"

...

"But I'M NOT THE MURDERER!" wailed Spencer, as the engines began to haul him up (Somehow, don't ask me where they got the winch from) "FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, DON'T LYNCH ME!"

"Okay, so explain to me why it is that you're trying to hang Spencer, again?" Edward would have massaged his temples had he hands, as Axel and he watched the operation from a distance.

"Ah, it was, as you say, elementary, my dear Edward!"

"That's the wrong detective, and he never really said that."

"You see, I had long since realized that James was a rather unpopular engine-"

"You amaze me, what does this have to do with Spencer doing...whatever that is?"

"So now what do we do?"

"Er...I don't know, Nev. I don't think any of us thought this far ahead."

Axel continued onwards. "But, however, I had also discovered during the course of my investigation that James was a rather vain perfectionist when it came to his looks! So much so, that he was willing to do just about anything to make sure that he remained _image parfaite_ for his big night! Where else could he have gotten the necessary products to make sure that this, his big night, went perfectly for him? Why, from a engine who was just as, if not more so, vain and image-obsessed, in Spencer! But the vainest, contrary to popular opinion, are the most likely to commit MURDER!"

"No, that's...that's not true."

"And so, Spencer bided his time, and set himself up the ultimate alibi!"

"...Okay, I'll bite. He was on the stage, giving his speech. How'd he do it?"

"Quite simple. In that shed, there are a variety of things that have not been used in years, even decades? I am correct, no?"

"Yes, that's right. So, you're saying that he found a old gun in there-"

"Yes."

"Had his driver or fireman rig it up to fire at James-"

"Indeed!"

"And fired it...how?"

"Why, with his telepathic powers, of course!"

Edward slumped. "Of course. How could I be so blind?"

"Ah, do not fret, mon amie, you cannot expect to deal with perfection."

"You clearly have come from some strange mental institution, and I begin to think that maybe I should stop them from stringing up Spencer." Edward started forward, and then hesitated as he remembered his race against Spencer. And the time that Spencer had threatened Hiro. And the time that Spencer had called him old, fat and slow (The many times). And that one time Spencer had decided that it would be an awful wheeze to trap Edward on Misty Island with the Logging Locos. "Well-" He remarked. "There's no real need to hurry-"

"The hell are you lot doing?"

Everyone stopped. The rope went slack, and Spencer plummeted down, landing face first. The engines stopped and gawped at James, who was very much alive, who gawped right back at them.

Edward was the first to find his voice "You're actually alive!?"

Hank frowned. "But, didn't you just say that it was mighty likely that James wasn't actually dead?"

"I was bluffing to try and get everyone to calm down! I didn't think he was murdered, but still! James, the hell happened to you!? There was this loud bang, someone screamed-"

"It wasnae me!" Emily shouted. "Ye think it was a girl, don't ye?!"

"-and then you were on the ground, not moving and then Axel came in and decided "Oh, let's play Silly Beggars!" and we almost hung Spencer."

"...What?!"

"James!"

"All I was doing was trying to sneak out a bit of boiler polish to make sure my boiler had a glossy sheen for my big speech about maintaining the beauty of your wheels-"

"I liked him better when he was dead!" shouted someone from the back, possibly Donald.

"-and I had to do it secretly, because Fatty wouldn't let me take any of my usual beautification stuff in. I think he wanted to punish me for something. Anyway, I was about halfway through a rather delightful-"And here James went off on a very long tangent about maintaining the correct amount of hygiene, and preventing boiler sludge from leaking out, while all the other engines immeidately lost interest and fell asleep. "-and so after I had applied the last bit, this incredibly loud bang interrupted me! In doing so, I splashed the remainder of my precious nectar onto the ground! I was heartbroken, and letting out a manly scream of despair-"

"Manly?" Hiro questioned.

"Yeah, no, it wasn't." Gordon agreed.

"CAN SOMEONE GET ME UP, PLEASE?!" wailed Spencer.

"-with a MANLY bellow, I collapsed onto my side in a dead faint! I thought I was dying, but I had, in fact, merely hit my head on a workman's bench." James coughed. "And then I woke up and suddenly you were all trying to murder Spencer."

"So that blood was actually...boiler polish. But the bang? If that wasn't a gun, then what-"

"Ah, I think I may have an answer to that." Connor sheepishly gestured with his eyes towards the remains of the balloon.

There was silence for a moment.

"So let me get this straight-" Edward began, with no small amount of weariness. "-James isn't actually dead, which means that there isn't a murder mystery, which means that we've all been running around accusing each other of a thing that hasn't actually happened in any way, shape or form, which means that we were about to do something to Spencer involving a rope, which means we have effectively wasted a entire night of our lives for no good reason. Furthermore, we've wasted said night and a good portion of the morning to listening to whatever the hell acid trip that Axel is on, because for whatever reason we didn't just ignore him completely. And to top it off, Donald and Douglas have gone AWOL somewhere, no doubt doing something particularly weird-"

The Scottish Twins puffed out with what remained of Thumper, which crumpled into dust before everyone.

As the bell rang to signal the end of the lock in, Edward turned, and made sure that the very large piece of metal was placed on his buffers. He puffed out, noting to himself that perhaps Space 1999 wasn't such a bad thing after all.

"Where are you going?" called the rather cowed Axel.

"I'm going to give the author a DAMN GOOD THRASHING!"

...

 **Yeah, I sort of just...didn't really have a proper way out of this. Hopefully the next chapter'll be rather good, even if- hang on, someone's burst through the door. Oh dear god EDWARD STOP! See you all next time, where hopefully I won't have been murdered by a insane train! OW! Cut it out!**


	4. In Which A Religion is Created

_Extract from Sir Edward the Blue Engine's latest book, What Were They Thinking?! 100 Tales of Stupidity From the Island of Sodor._

 **Chapter 4: The James Way**

During 2004, we were having a rather rough time of it. Not to talk too much about it (I still have the second volume of my memoirs to go, of course) but there were certain disagreements with the production staff and the railway on how things were to be run. As such, our media output became rather less than it had been in recent years. Not to say that it was successful (I refer you to Chapter 5 of this book to talk about the 'Kippergate' fiasco with Terry Wogan, and Chapter 36 for the incident with the custard pies on Just a Minute) but it was still a restriction that many of us chafed at.

However, by a rather good stroke of luck, the crew packed up their cameras after filming, and therefore had no idea that a certain red engine was planning a rather, shall we say, interesting way of staging a comeback.

I should probably explain. James was, out of all us, the most media hungry person you could find. Oh Thomas was definitely a top contender for that title, but at the same time, even he had his limits. James? None whatsoever that I can think of. Thus, the restrictions took his toll on him, and he was desperate to get back into the limelight, as it was.

It began a hot day, late October, where the leaves were falling from the trees, the wind was beginning to turn bitter and so on. I was reading the newspaper, and was drawn by a article discussing the top ten weirdest moments of Tom Cruise. Of course, the main one was his religion.

"Ha!" I laughed. "Celebrities are nuts. I mean, you look at them, and you think that they're just like you or me. But then you read something like this-"

The other tender engines looked over, and made various comments that agreed with me. Not so much James. He looked over, read the article, and then asked his driver to explain what Scientology was. When he got the news back, his eyes went wider than saucers.

"James!" I said, suddenly realizing that he was getting one of his ideas again.

"And to think!" he proclaimed "That I was such a fool not to think of it before!" He ran out of the Sidings laughing maniacally to himself. Luckily it was off season, so he didn't immediately run smack into Murdoch and spend the next few months in works.

I think I may have typed the wrong word.

Later that night, James tried to convince us of what it would be like to work for his new religion and church, the latter of which was creatively called 'The Church of James'. "Just think! You, Edward, could be my archbishop!"

"How about no."

"But Edward! Don't you want to be at the forefront of the latest, ground-breaking and innovative religion that's sweeping the nation?"

"It hasn't even swept anywhere beyond your insane mind" remarked Toby. He was rather astute in this suggestion. "What does this even involve?"

"Well, I believe that many people are out there crying out for a way to improve their lives! A way for them to become happier! A way to enlightenment and understanding of how the universe works and how it's core tenets can be understood in full!"

"We have that already." I remarked patiently. "It's called Buddhism."

"But Buddhism does not focus around ME! Which is the major selling point."

"In that we're going to have to sell off several parts of the Island just to get out of debt?" Henry asked sweetly.

James wouldn't listen. And unfortunately for us, he managed to talk a few of us into helping him. I was slightly downgraded from Archbishop to Secretary. What that means I still have no idea. On the plus side, I got to get a rather spiffy new coat of paint. Gordon and Henry became bodyguards for James, somehow, and Henry was given the additional task of trying to ramble on for a good thirty minutes on the official 'Church of James' hotline. Somehow, that was a thing.

To be honest, we probably should have rethought the entire deal when we learnt that James had been ordained from someone who looked like a walking carpet and spoke only in the language of the Flowerpot Men. But James flashed several large checks at us, and so, despite trying to talk him into calling the whole thing off, we stayed.

Things went wrong almost immediately once we hired Mr Lancaster, some big shot PR guru from Callan, to help shoot the commercial. Fortunately for the viewers of TV, it could only air at night on specific channels that no one was watching. James, however, thought that this would be the beginning of a marketing gimmick not seen since some genius decided to put a tiger on a cereal box and roll his r's a little.

"It will be AMAZING!" said he "It will take the world by storm! It shall be bold! Fresh! One of a kind!"

"Well, one out of three isn't the worst." muttered Gordon. He was wearing a wig to play 'Sheila' from Australia, who had apparently had her life changed by the Church of James all for the better. He was not enjoying it. Henry wasn't having much luck either. He had been painted blue to play the role of Steve from Holland, who had been a total loser who sent women to the nunnery whenever he tried to flirt with them, until he had taken the Jamesian religion and had become a stud magnet.

"Didn't we learn something from the last time someone tried to paint me blue?" he pleaded, to no avail.

Luckily, I was not put in the commercial. Lancaster had this grand vision that he was going to eventually become this world renowned director of artistic movies. I perhaps did not endear him to me when I suggested that this meant that he'd have to make movies that were 50% symbolical claptrap and the other 50% consisted of shots of women's breasts heaving up and down whilst having coitus with men. While covered in blood. He decided that there was no place for me in his masterpiece.

Masterpiece. HA! It was a master disaster, let me tell you. Henry ended up getting stuck in a lake, Gordon apparently forgot that he was supposed to be from Sydney and delivered the most interesting interpretation of a Russian accent I've ever heard and in the end we had to resort to using stock footage of James from other episodes, because the great stupid berk (Sorry, that should be Reverend Great Stupid Berk) had become camera shy at the worst possible time.

But that was over and done with in a day. At the very least, we could move on with our lives.

Unfortunately, then we had to actually start living up to the promises James had made.

He had advertised that for all those who subscribed to his new religion, there would be a spanking new 'Starter Pack' to get people, well, started on the way to happiness and blah blah. This included:

-A inflatable, life size version of the one true savior and champion of the people, His Lord Holiness in all continents great and small, Minister Supreme King Above All the Others Reverend James Esquire the First. Yes, seriously, that was his full name and title. We shortened it down to Reverend James on everything that was put out, but that was what he insisted was to be put on the leaflets.  
-The first two of a fifty four set of tapes. Yes, I repeat, FIFTY FOUR sets of tapes. FIFTY. FOUR. We gave out more tapes than there are weeks in a year. This was supposedly to detail the vast and expansive lore of the Jamesian philosophy. But then suggesting that Reverend James had come up with the idea to make a quick buck was not going to entice people, now was it?  
-A free sample of boiler polish. I told the Reverend that it was foolish, but he laughed in my face.  
-A rather lengthy book (None of us read it) that supposedly was a 'How to Begin' book that explained the techniques of the Church Of James and how one could apply them to one's life. It numbered at 665 pages originally, until I added a brief index to bring it up to the number of the devil in revolt.  
-And finally, there was a free ERTL toy for the kids to enjoy. Don't ask me, we had a lot of leftover ERTL toys, we had to shift them somehow.

...

Problems immediately became clear when it was revealed that the company supposedly making these Starter's Packs were not, in fact, a real company. No, instead these would be packaged, constructed, contained and delivered in the proper and orderly fashion...by the three of us, plus Toby, Emily and Arthur. I don't know why he was there, in hindsight.

After one of the longest and most painful experiences of my life (Bear in mind, I have had my crank pins break off, my boiler nearly give out from chasing a certain red runaway and there was that whole business with Diesel 10), we eventually managed to help our drivers put the things together, and sent it all off, nice and secure.

Someone, clearly, did not alert Reverend James to the fact that we had done a good job, as we later learned he opened the crates up, found fault with everything that we had done, and ordered a selection of people who had nothing better to do to redo the whole thing. And as you tell from later on, they did so very, very badly.

Oh, but that wasn't even the start of it. I ended up having to deal with the internet side of things. Yes, that's right, me. Me. Edward the Blue Engine. Quite frankly, my understanding of the internet was that it was a thing...and that was it. However, instead of putting Emily in charge of it, as she did in fact run a blog (Mostly by using her crew and occasionally, workmen who were kind enough to type in the words) they put me in charge of having to deal with customer feedback. I will say this. Most of the people I met were nothing short of marvelous. Polite, well spoken, patient...I was lucky I didn't get the crackpots.

No, those I passed onto the Reverend James himself.

But I had to admit that it was becoming dangerously clear that the Reverend's path was ending on a cliff. Over a lake of fire. With TNT strapped to the sleepers. Not least because several angry mothers complained that one of the recordings of the tapes contained several occultic messages (James's face had never turned whiter than it had then. Someone was definitely fired for that) and also following on from the fact that the banks were beginning to ask where the money for the proposed Jamesian Theme Park was coming from.

And then, famously, there came our first gathering, supposedly to raise awareness and some such. Myself, Henry, Gordon and the Reverend himself were heading off to a specially constructed stage to talk to some bright young things about the way of James.

In retrospect, I think that I would have preferred to sniff glue for a hour.

...

Our first and last seminar took place in Manchester, on a cold night in early November.

It was...well, to be frank, it was a complete waste of time. Also, we were nearly killed.

I mean, it all started out well enough. Okay, that's a little bit of a lie. It started out with James getting pissy about the fact that his podium wasn't nearly as large as Gordon's one. This wouldn't have been too bad had he not chosen to raise the fuss as we were on the lecture platform, and therefore shove past me and Henry to force Gordon to switch podiums on pain of docking pay. I was already beginning to regret that I had allowed myself to be talked into doing this, but anything to break up the monotony of life on our Island recently.

Then the speech began.

I will give James this, he is nothing if not a shrewd talker. Perhaps realizing that the truth, that he was born in one of the best workshops imaginable, got to star in a rather successful TV show and ate caviar exclusively from 1988 to 1990, would not touch the hearts and minds of the good youth of Manchester. No, he spun some incredibly complicated yarn of being homeless for ten years after his construction, a brief period of using drugs (Which is true enough, but I don't think it was because he wanted to drown out his nightmares. In fact I can recall a conversation where he told me he had taken the drugs in the sixties because "Why not?") and, of course, the natural part of the sob story, talking at length about how all the money was going towards making sure that his dear old mother had a good life ahead of her in the retirement sheds.

First of all, I was about to point out, we don't have mothers. Second of all, even if we did, we can't actually...well, to put it bluntly, have the sex. And third of all, it's not working, stop what you're doing you silly bat and start plugging the bloody book. But no! It continued on!

After dodging several questions by clever students on what the 'actual hell was the James way' by responding that it was better than the Great Western way (I felt Duck shudder thousands of miles away) he then took a question from a rather bright looking person who asked the following question.

"I recently bought the start-up collection that you advertised recently, but all I received was a inflatable version of you with holes in it, a series of rather hastily stapled together pamphlets that just read "BE LIKE JAMES, YOU WILL BE FINE" in varying sizes of fonts and tapes that contain white noise. Is this normal?"

The silly bastard immediately put me on the spot by telling me to give the girl a answer. ME! I have no idea, I just make the tea and have to trudge back and forth getting the bloody crates! I stumbled my way through a frankly embarrassing explanation that unfortunately, our supplier was struggling at the moment (Which is true, considering that the supplier of the inflatable James's was a rather puffed out Toby) and that we would refund everyone who had similar problems. Several of them noted that they had received similar books of a similar nature (One of which was a picture book, with James in various poses that would be considered slightly pornographic if a steam engine wasn't doing them. How this was supposed to inspire them, I'll never know) and the crowd began to grow angry.

Then Henry suggested that to lighten the mood, perhaps James might tell us a joke.

I wanted to strangle him then. Not as much as I do now. If there has ever been a time when I lament my lack of buffers...

I looked at James. I prayed to whatever gods there were, and quite a few that weren't, that whatever he came up with was so bad that it stunned the crowd so that we could escape. I could see the cogs in his head turning.

Then he opened his mouth:

"So, what does Man United and a pile of poo have in common besides the obvious?"

I remember very little about what happened next, because somehow one of the students managed to wrench a brick from the nearest wall and flung it at James. As all good Reverends do, he immediately threw one of his flock in the way. That member was me. Apparently, Gordon and Henry began backing off the rails specially lain for us and began to beat a hasty retreat, Henry dragging my unconscious form with him.

We made it back in one piece (More or less. It was as if the entire Manchester area had risen up from the ground like zombies!) though Gordon's funnel was badly bent, I had several large cuts and bruises on my face and Henry was dented somewhat by the fact that they had chucked the ERTL models at him. That was the only real disappointing bit for me! I loved the ERTL models, and to waste free gifts like that was rather ungrateful. Though to be fair, they did pay £35 pound for a tub of something they couldn't use, a few bits of rubber that your child could choke on, some tapes that didn't work or alternatively were secretly attempts to brainwash them with occult symbols and whatever the hell James was writing in the books into the bargain, so perhaps it was understandable.

When we got back, James (who we later had to rescue from being drowned as a witch. A long story which is too complicated and boring to say) realized that he had gone massively into debt, and promptly liquidated the religion forwith. We were strictly forbidden by anyone to mention 'The Church of James' around him, though of course, Thomas and Percy delighted in saying so. They had enjoyed the whole thing enormously. We finally ended up paying off the debts by selling Great Wateron in 2008. And there's your excuse for it not being in the show after that.

And that is the story of how the four of us were banned from ever entering Manchester again.


	5. In Which A 'Story' is Told

"BoCoooooooo."

The Metropolitan Vickers ignored the very whiny moan from the opposite shed. At least, he tried to. But no matter how much he forced what passed for his ears to close and let him succumb to the Land of Nod's seductive charms, that irritating little voice refused to die down. It was Bill. Or Ben. Really, it didn't actually matter. One was as bad as the other. And when combined...

Slowly, BoCo allowed his weary eyes to rest upon Edward. Wisely, the blue engine had made sure to fall asleep faster than BoCo so that he wouldn't be left with the inevitable chat at midnight with the twins. Which meant, and here BoCo had to try and stop himself from shuddering, another goddamn bed-time story.

The twins were adult in many ways, yet insisted that this was the only way to get them to sleep. BoCo had the distinct idea that they were mocking both he and Edward somehow. But it was too much hassle to actually confront them on it. They hadn't burned down any sheds this time (THIS time) so he wasn't exactly about to get them angry enough to do so at this time of night.

"BoCoooooooo-"

"'m coming." muttered BoCo, and idled forward. It was Ben. Bill seemed to be smirking in his sleep. BoCo scoffed quietly. "All right, you little buzzbox, I suppose you want a story, right?"

"Right. How'd you guess?"

"Call it intuition. Right, fine, here's a classic. It's called Mavis White and the Seven Narrow Gauge Engines."

"I'm not sure I like this story."

"I'm not sure I should tell it to you then."

...

 _"Once upon a time, there was...an evil queen. Yeah, let's go with that. And basically, she was rather proud of her looks. Let's call her Queen Daisy for now. She slathered her face with so much make-up that she, at times, looked like she didn't actually have a face at all. Regardless, she was considered the most fairest in all the land. I...guess? I mean, I'm not entirely sure if they were counting men or what have you. Whatever."_

"I LOVE BEING EVIL!" declared Queen Daisy at the top of her lungs. The palace staff kept on nodding. Or at least, the engine equivalent of. Queen Daisy was want to go ape-shit sometimes and murder a couple of engines.

 _"The Queen, who was a vain cow, would demand that her royal dogbodies, Edward and, er, Bocco, would slave away and constantly hold up a large and powerful mirror. The mirror was magical, and so each time the Queen asked the famous words-"_

"Magic Mirror, on that clod, do I still have the fairest bod?"

"Crikey, this mirror ways a ton!" Edward wheezed, his wheels beginning to give way as he fell on his side. The Spirit of the Mirror, who was a rather fabulous red engine, glared at the dogsbody on the ground, who was groaning quite painfully.

 _"-The Magic Mirror would respond with more random rhyming stuffs because we apparently like rhyming."_

"Yo, my babes, you are the true hottie! You're the real Geordie who shows up all the Scotties!"

"HEY!" shouted random servant who will be played by Douglas for this one.

"There is no other gal, my fair Regina, you are the fairest of them all, especially your-"

"WELL NEVER MIND THAT." said Edward, who very quickly wheeled the mirror back.

"OI! I was in the middle of my most bodacious awesome rap! Unbuffer me, you monster!"

"James, it's a weird enough story as it is, just give in."

Daisy blinked. "Well that happened." She remarked to no one in particular. "Anyway, back to the important job of being a BABE!"

 _"And so it went on for several years. The Queen consulted her magic mirror daily, and every time, the answer was still the same. And so Daisy imagined it would always be. Until, of course, the king died. It was apparently natural causes, but I don't think there was anything natural about all that blood. And the fact that he had somehow managed to hang, shoot and decapitate himself at the same time."_

"WOE IS ME!" wailed Daisy. "WOE! WOE AND THRICE WOE!" Her weeping suddenly ceased. "Oh well. I must carry on, I suppose." She fluttered her eyelashes at the gathered mourners, who all gulped. It wasn't that it wasn't tempting to get in an alliance with a rather beautiful engine, it was just that they also liked having bodies to hang onto.

Luckily, they were interrupted by the shed door slamming open. There, standing in the light, was a rather baffled looking female diesel. "Hello? Is this the right shed? There's just so damn many of them."

 _"And instantly, her majesty could tell that all attention was now upon Princess Mavis. She was the King's adopted daughter because engines can't have sex. Let's...let's just get that out there now. And Mavis had been away doing a degree in something or other, thus Daisy had had the run of the place. But now, she felt threatened. For Mavis was not that bad looking herself, and was also more liked by the common folk. Daisy wasn't sure why. She adored them, when they got things right and she didn't have to constantly put her to death. So, as the dirty old men leered at Mavis, and she kicked their asses, she consulted her magic mirror once more."_

"Mirror Mirror, with the paint of red, am I still the groovy cat who knocks em dead?"

"Your rhyming skills really need work." said Bocco, who tried to get in a more comfortable position to support the mirror.

 _"The mirror considered for a moment, and then responded-"_

"This is a change of scenery, a real different sight, the fairest one of them all is...GASP! Mavis White!"

"She doesn't have a last name."

"Shut up, Edward, it makes the story go faster."

 _"The queen was furious-"_

"I AM FURIOUS!"

 _"-and began immediately to plot and scheme. She knew that taking care of the girl outright with a quick execution tended not to reflect well on the monarchy. There was all this talk of some sort of 'dem-ock-racee' and that would never do. So she called her faithful huntsman to her side. He was lightning fast, and was there almost at the very moment she called for him._

 _..._

 _..._

 _..._

 _I SAID HE WAS THERE ALMOST AT THE VERY MOMENT SHE CALLED FOR HIM._

 _..._

 _..._

 _..._

 _..._

 _..._

 _GORDON THAT'S YOUR BLOODY CUE!"_

"WAH! WHA?!" Gordon the Huntsman stumbled, tripped and then smacked his sizable nose into the ground before springing to action like a spring. He looked around sheepishly and tried to salute. He had forgotten that they didn't have arms. Not to worry though, the author forgets that every so often as well. "Ah! Your majesty! What do you want of me?"

Daisy looked up, contemptuously. Her driver was filing her buffers. "You took your sweet time. Faithful huntsman, I have a task for you. It requires great speed, ruthlessness and cunning!" She paused. "I suppose two out of three isn't bad."

"What manner of beast do you wish for me to slay?!"

"We call it a nag." Daisy grinned. "You are to take the Princess Mavis into the nearest quarry, where she can look at rock, I guess."

"Ah ha! I am facing down ROCKS as my enemy!"

"...Follow me on this one, Gordon. There, I think it would be easy for an accident to befall her." Daisy winked.

Gordon frowned. "Pardon?"

"AN. ACCIDENT. With a rockfall, no doubt, you can get creative on that score."

Gordon was blanker than a solid white space up and going on TV to play Blankety Blank. "Er...you wish for me to do what with her?"

"...Gordon, I'm going to give this to you bluntly. Kill her. And bring back her heart, as well. I mean, I'm kind of into that."

"...Am I going to get into trouble for this?"

"Only if you don't do what you're told."

...

 _"Engines don't have hearts."_

 _"Hush, Bill. Nice of you to join us, by the way. Anyhow, the next day, the huntsman took young Mavis out to the quarry as the queen had instructed. He was a complete boor and ass, but he did draw the line at actually killing engines. What the animals had to say about this has not been recorded."_

"And, er, there's some rocks. You know, so, er, have fun with that." Gordon frowned. This was going to be tricky. He had never really actually had to kill someone like this before. How he hunted the game was unsure. He just sort of ran it over with his wheels and hoped that what was left was a salvageable trophy. He sighed, as Mavis stared at the rocks with boredom.

His first attempt was to shout very, very loudly in the hope of causing a landslide. "AYIYIYIYIYIYIYIYIYIYIYIYI!" He screeched. That accomplished nothing other than gaining him looks of confusion, pity and disgust, and also wearing his voice out.

His second attempt was to climb to the top of the mountain and sort of push one of the very large boulders onto Mavis. To do so, he insisted that the photographer take a picture. He had to pay him fifteen pounds, plus VAT on the camera, to get him to do it, before he hurried up the hill. As he arrived, puffed out as all hell, he gave a quick little shove, gave up, and headed back down.

The boulder followed him.

One extremely painful bash later, Gordon limped back to Mavis, and suggested that they do something else. Mavis stared at him, and asked-

"You want to kill me, don't you?"

 _"The Huntsman broke down and wept. He pled for forgiveness, for mercy and for perhaps a bit of ointment because ouch that boulder really hurt. Mavis was rather embarrassed. She had only been joking. She used her buffers to pat him gently, before suggesting that he go and take a lie down. As he puffed away, he noticed her standing on the edge of the cliff into the quarry lake. And that was when Gordon's good sense abandoned him, and he tried to shove her in the lake. Just as she moved away and sort of wandered off towards the forest."_

SPLASH.

 _"You can guess how well that went for him. Dejected, and very wet, he returned to the castle. His driver had drawn the word 'HEART' on a lumpy piece of cardboard, which he presented to Daisy. She responded only by giving him a very frustrated look, and deciding to cancel welfare benefits for the day."_

...

 _"Elsewhere, Mavis was considering perhaps moving to Spain, when suddenly she found herself in the middle of the woodland creatures having a frolic. She decided that she had clearly seen too much, and was about to turn back and take her chance with Gordon, when the birds insistently chirped that she needed to go in THAT direction."_

"Well, I mean, I'm listening to talking birds and my...step-mother? I think? She's trying to kill me, at any rate. Why not?!" And so she followed the critters to a rather dusty shed in a rather secluded part of the mountains.

"Well...I mean, I could clean it up, but really it's none of my business." So she sat and waited for the inhabitants to return, so as she could get oil and refreshment and perhaps the way to Amarillo.

"Now, she had no way of knowing this, but she was near the shed of seven little-"

"Men?"

 _"-sods. These engines regularly had to be dragged out of their beds and forced to go to work in a damp and dusty mine looking for random stuff that, if it did sell well, never got back to them. These seven were making their way home now. There was Duke, the stuffy leader who had no idea what reality was like."_

"That'd never suit his grace! Back in my day, he would have given us a grand sum of diamonds!"

 _"There was Pissy, who was a rather rude individual who was all for destroying the monarchy."_

"Shut it, granpuff! The revolution will come! UP THE WORKERS!"

"And up yours."

 _"That was Drunky, who regularly fell into lakes on account of...well, it's in the name, isn't it?"_

"I say *HIC!* are we any *HIC* closer to home?"

 _"Pushing him and making sure that he didn't go over the side of the bridge and into the water was Saney. Named because they were clearly the only sane one there."_

"Almost there, now, Skar- Er, I mean, Drunky."

 _"Then there was Snarly. He was Scottish. VERY Scottish."_

"ACH! It's a disgrace, do ye here me?! We should rise up taday! Down with the Fat Man!"

 _"Skulking behind him was Pratty. Can you guess what his major character trait is?"_

"I say, Duke, Mr Fox says we should take a shortcut tonight! We might bump into a engine at our sheds! A woman!"

"HA! That'll be the day, ye daft bastard!"

 _"Oh, and last and definitely least, there was Blandy. He was bland."_

"I say, well gee golly gosh gumpkins, oughtn't we to be getting back home, by gum?!"

"Shut it, Blandy." said Pissy, grumpily, as they approached the shed. "Hang about. Look at that! There's a chick outside our bachelor pad!"

"Ach, it's one of them yon smelly diesels!"

There was a very long, and pregnant pause, as Snarly and Saney looked at each other for the longest time, each willing the other to make a move. Snarly broke first, and muttered something that was half insult and half apology. That was the closest you got with his kind.

"Right!" said Duke, taking charge. "MEN! FORWARD...MARCH!"

"All right, all right, no need to shout." muttered Mavis as she exited the shed. "I was just waiting for you to ask a couple of favors."

"Woah, missy!" said Duke, rather embarrassed. "We don't go in for that kind of thing around here."

"Speak for yourself!" chorused Drunky, Pissy, Snarly and Pratty. The latter one was just saying it to feel more involved.

"Look, I just need a place to kip for the night, is that okay? And I guess I'll...help out a bit. You know. You look like you need it."

"The hell does that mean?!" There was a loud sproinging sound as one of Pissy's springs burst out and hit Blandy in the face. "Okay, never mind, carry on."

"I'll help clean up the shed, make it a bit more homely, get rid of the drugs when the cops show up, and I'll even go so far as to give you a large sum when I return to my life at the palace. In return, you just have to let me sleep for the next month on the proverbial sofa."

 _"Now, two out of the seven engines were very much anti-royalty. Another two out of the five that remained were very, very stupid. Of the three that remained, only two could be considered to be reasonably sane for more than half of the time. And of THOSE two, there was only one who wasn't likely to go scuttling off to the Queen in return for some cold beer._

 _But out of the seven engines, seven of them were very, very, very fond of money. And so a bargain was struck."_

...

"Which just goes to show-" said George, passing by. "-that capitalism will always win. The greedy so and so's!"

"SOD OFF!"

...

 _"Now, the Queen was thinking-"_

"I'M THINKING!"

 _"-and she decided once more to consult the Magic Mirror. It was Bocco's sick day that eve, as he had somehow managed to break his entire chassis. Anything to get out of work. So that meant she had to get Henry the gardener to hold the mirror up. And she spake into it."_

"Mirror and so on, get a grip, is this the face that launches many a ship?"

 _"The Mirror looked nervous, for he was aware that he had rather bad news for her, and he really didn't want to get smashed into pieces. How fabulous he wouldn't look like that! But, he was compelled to tell the truth, and in rhyme, of all the horrors."_

"Er, Queenie, sweetheart, you're still great. But Mavis White is still the people's mate."

"You in there, are you thick? Mavis White's as dead as a brick!"

The Mirror laughed. "My word you aren't well informed, she's with the Narrow Gauge engines, the most deformed. Up in the mountains, where they work all day, they let her stay at the shed in hope of getting a lay."

"HA!" said the Queen with great contempt. "Find me that bloody Huntsman! Gardener! You, with the look of a commoner about you, where is Gordon?!"

"He, er, decided that he had always wanted to be a ballerina. In Turkey." Henry grinned as wide as he could and hoped this through her off the scent. She sniffed, and turned away, forgetting that he even existed.

 _"The Queen was absolutely seething with rage-"_

"I AM ABSOLUTELY SEETHING WITH RAGE!"

 _"-and so began to make a plot. Firstly, she would need the service of two assassins of the highest caliber, to take care of Little Miss Mavis with brutal quickness. And if that failed, then she had a backup plan or two. Quickly, she sent the word out that she was looking for a rather good pair of killers._

 _She got George, a fat and slow steamroller, and Bulgy, a common bus, instead. Still, needs must. That night, as the eight engines slept after rather a stressful day, the two off-rail vehicles crept in like silent phantoms."_

There was a loud series of crashes and bangs as Bulgy drove straight into the wall. George rolled his eyes, and then rolled a hell of a lot more as Mavis promptly tipped him arse over teakettle, flat on his back.

 _"The assassins returned empty handed, and told the Queen that she could bloody well do what she liked from now on, they were going to do something less stressful, like join a leper colony. The Queen smiled, and did something very cunning. She removed most of her make-up. She looked like a different engine. So much so that her guards promptly threw her out upon seeing her."_

"Ah." said the Queen, wincing at hte sharp pain in her head. "I should really have thought this through." But with a shrug, or the engine equivalent of one, she slipped down into the works. There, she watched with great interest as a rather fresh little apple was pumped full of all the nasty stuff that would cause anyone to collapse and stop breathing within a minute of eating it.

 _"The Queen's poison apple cookbook (Available now at all good book stores) stated that there was no known antidote, aside from true love's kiss. She laughed at that, and insisted that her driver place a wax apple in the basket so as to give the appearance that she wasn't just wandering around with a single bloody apple. That would have been rather suspicious._

 _Elsewhere, after a long night of snoring, ranting and whatever the hell Pratty got up to, the little engines set off for their thankless task of doing work again. They wished Mavis a fond (Well, mostly fond) farewell, after getting her to promise to not let anyone in the shed that she didn't know. However, no sooner were they gone, when over the hill came a wheezing old crone."_

"Oh, this song and dance." thought Mavis, cynically. But she smiled and cheerfully asked if the female engine who was definitely not Daisy no way no how would like to come in for a drink of something.

Daisy grinned to herself. How foolish this girl was! Clearly this would have all gone a lot faster if she hadn't relied on idiots and morons to do her dirty work for her. As Mavis's driver loaded her up with a barrel of oil, she gave her sweetest and most sincere grin. A gargoyle fainted. "Thank you kindly, dearie, and for your kindness, I have here an apple to reward you!"

"Oh. How...lovely." Mavis ever so casually bumped the table. The top began to slowly move around. "So, what's so special about this apple?"

"It's no ordinary apple! It is a...magic apple."

"Oh." said Mavis, as if Daisy had just remarked that some inclement weather was on the way, for she had read this story a couple of times. "How thrilling. And I suppose if I take a bite out of it, I'll get my heart's desire and whatever I dream of will come true?"

"Er, yes." said the Queen, who had originally just been planning to leave it at 'magic' apple and hope for the best. "So, what are you waiting for? Take a bite! Here, I'll take one too!" Both drivers picked the apple nearest to them and handed it to the engines. They bit down at the same time.

 _"Instantly, Mavis turned pale. She moaned and groaned and screamed and whined and shouted out at random-"_

"OH GOD! WHY DID YOU TAKE ONE OF YOUR OWN!?"

 _"-which was news to everyone. She gagged and wailed and bemoaned as she flopped around like a fish, before at last, falling still with her tongue hanging out, her eyes closed and her buffers...well, if they had been hands, they would have been placed to her breast. If she had one."_

"What a ham." muttered Queen Daisy as she left. Still, she was rather happy. Soon the little engines would be coming back, and when they did-

It was at this point that she noticed that she was feeling a little warmer than usual. "Hmmm. That's odd." She continued on, but even so, it was rather distracting. She licked her lips, but she was rather surprised to find that they were still dry.

She was still puzzling this out when she promptly flopped to the ground, dead.

Back at the sheds, Mavis spat out the remains of the wax apple that she had eaten, and grinned. Then she ordered her driver to pack her bags, and headed off to inform the little engines that they were going to be getting an upgrade on the house situation.

The second she left, Prince Thomas Charming crashed through the trees. "All right, where are the girls...at?" He frowned. "Phooey."

"And so, after Edward and Bocco smashed the mirror-"

"OUCH YOU BRUTES!"

"-and made an escape towards a far off land known only as Canada, Mavis returned and was crowned Queen. She gave the seven engines a great deal of money and power, (Six immediately squandered it, the only one who didn't was, of course, Saney, who managed to marry into the royal family) and they all lived happily ever after...until the dead arose from their graves and so began the war of the living and the undead. The end."

...

BoCo looked at Bill and Ben, who were now legitimately to sleep for real. He had rather rushed that last part just to get it over with. Despite that, he had rather enjoyed himself, even if he now was even more tired than he had been before.

"Little rascals." he chuckled, and headed back to his shed.

He was just getting back to sleep when-

"BoCooooo-"

"Edward, shut your gob, I'm not telling you a story."

"Spoilsport."

* * *

If this is popular, might do more of these. It was funner than expected!


	6. In Which A Shed Rises and Falls

Damn, been a while since I've done one of these! And to celebrate the return of Tales from the Abridgement, let's have another chapter from Edward's book! This is pretty much just filler until the next chapter, which is...oh boy! Fun times will be had.

* * *

 _Extract from Sir Edward the Blue Engine's latest book, What Were They Thinking?! 100 Tales of Stupidity From the Island of Sodor._

 **Chapter 53: Look Out Bob the Builder, Here We Come!**

"You ever see that show on TV?"

I glanced over the rim of my newspaper (Carefully propped up on the shed wall so that I could read most of the interesting gossip) and looked at Gordon, tilting my face at an angle slightly. Don't ask me how I do it, I just can. "Well, I'd say yes, but you could be talking about any one of the million of shows past, present or future."

It was early 2006. By this point, we were readily getting rather sick of our show, mostly because the people in charge had no bloody idea how to make us look anything even remotely approaching positive. We were all mightily peeved, and had therefore done what all engines do, and grouped together to bitch and moan. Not about the hard working people who actually worked behind the cameras, no, but rather at the very bad scripts we were being delivered.

In retrospect, I think we had it lucky.

Why do I tell you this? Because this was during one of those wonderful little periods of quiet in the midst of the usual chaos of filming. Twenty eight episodes had been ordered by the higher ups, and therefore, around about episode 14, the production staff had taken a break. We were left to relax as best we could, and we were in good spirits.

Then Gordon opened his mouth.

"You know, Grand Designs?"

"Oh yeah, it's not that bad." I looked back to my paper. There was a rather interesting bit of news about a new series of Lewis, remember that? They'd shown the pilot earlier on the year, so I was a bit more distracted than I normally would have been.

"Oh, I love that show! Really does give you a sense of achievement when they finish up that house, doesn't it?" enthused Arthur. Why he was there I have little idea, I remember that Thomas and Percy were off having a chat about something important. What, I can't remember.

Toby was smarter than me, as he often is, and quickly saw where this was heading. "Anyway, so, that new Magic Roundabout movie's out on DVD, we could always give it a spin. True, it's CGI, but I guess it is the future-"

"You know-" began Gordon "-I was so taken with that show, that I asked around. Apparently, The Pack have been commissioned to do some work up at Bluff's Cove, building a brand new house for the Harbormaster."

"Gordon, you didn't-"

"So, Miss Jenny said that as the Pack was so overworked, we could take over for them this one time-"

"YOU DIDN'T!"

"So guess who's building a house!?"

There was a chorus of groans, and I firmly told Gordon "No. NO."

He didn't listen. In the end, most of us, bar Arthur who I think was just really bored down at the Fishing Village, went along with it so that Gordon didn't kill himself by accident. In a way, we'd have been better off leaving him to hurt himself and only himself.

...

Before I continue, let me briefly state what I mean by 'building' this shed. I do not mean that we magically grew hands and legs, and leaped from the rails to begin assembling a mighty big block of buildings. No, that would be silly.

Then again, considering what has happened in our lives so far, perhaps I shouldn't be so quick to suggest that.

No, what happened was actually rather interesting. Sodor Intelligence Taskforce, or SIT as they prefer to be known, had been investigating how much control engines have over their bodies. This was during a period in which most of our drivers had been laid off for some silly reason, and thus we were relied upon to do most of the starting, stopping, judging and so on that they and the fireman would have normally carried out. So they designed some technology, bolted it to our fronts, and had us wear it to see if we had control over it.

In this case, Gordon had asked them to put together hammers that we could use, bolting them to our buffer beams and using a mechanism within the part to force the hammer up and down whenever we needed it.

We had great fun watching the test subject (Gordon) accidentally slam the hammer into his own face several times until he finally got the hang of it. But our merriment soon ended when we discovered that said test subject had also been in charge of making the blueprints for the complicated construction. He had carte blanche to tell the artists what to draw.

To clarify, let me explain to you here what the idea was. This was a one floor shed, there was no complicated system like in Chuggington or whatever it's called, whereupon you had fancy-schmancy stairlifts to get you to your shed and spin you around if you didn't like the view. No, this was a simple roundhouse shed design, with a few other bits that I'll get to later.

Where did the problems start? Well, let me put it to you this way. The name of the type of shed we wanted was probably an indication of what shape it needed to be, correct?

So, try and explain to me how Gordon managed to take the word ' **round** house' and come up with something that looked like a isosceles triangle mutated by acid. Answers on a postcard please, because for the life of me, I don't get it.

Oh, but that wasn't all! Oh, if that was the only problem we had, this wouldn't even be in the honorable mentions section! Now, even though Gordon had got the shape wrong, he had gotten the correct amount of berths right. According to the specifications we were given, we were to make sure that there were twelve in total, just in case. This shed was for visiting engines, so that they wouldn't need to worry that much about having to slum it with us. We can get pretty rowdy. So as I say, he got twelve berths correct.

It took us a while to actually work that out though.

"Gordon." remarked Toby after about three minutes of puzzling over this. "Just a quick question. How long would you estimate is the average berth?"

"Good lord, little Toby! Everyone knows that! Why, a berth is...is...um...it's quite long! Quite, very long."

"I make it twenty five feet, give or take." Arthur remarked.

"Well, okay, if you want it in feet, twenty five feet, why?"

Toby very smartly pointed out that, seeing as the twelve berths were not of the same size, and in fact seemed to be decreasing in size as they went down the very baffled triangle shaped shed, this would mean that visting engines would be more comfortable sleeping on the actual shed roof. At which point, Gordon got a bit huffy, cursed the artist and noted that they'd have another draft made up.

"Any other problems?" he remarked through gritted teeth.

"Just that I have to commend ye on a rather nice economic choice!"

"Oh, thank you, Emily!"

"It's going to save a wee tidy sum on carpentry!"

"...Pardon?"

"Well, I mean, not having any doors is an unique idea in and of itself-"

That was the last we saw of Gordon for several days.

...

And after several more blueprints (Each that managed to be more baffling than the last, but my editor'd probably have a heart attack if I went on about how improperly this was done) we finally got a round shed with equal sized berths that could fit any engine into it.

So far, so...well, not good, but salvageable.

Oh dear.

I shall present the incidents that happened in a more trunucated form than I usually would, for fear of causing my migraine to come back.

Problem 1: Area set aside for building has turned into very problematic sinkhole.  
Logical Solution: Move to new sight not far from sinkhole, or wait for ground to calm down and then survey the situation from there.  
What We Did: Build shed above sinkhole via the use of very confusing and VERY IMPRACTICAL stilts.

Problem 2: None of us know anything about construction aside from what we've seen on Bob the Builder.  
Logical Solution: Give up. Go home.  
What We Did: Followed Gordon's advice of "Eh, f**k it, we'll pick it up as we go along!" and started work somehow.

Problem 3: Proposed area for workmen to take up residence appears to have been vandalized.  
Logical Solution: Call someone smart in, see what they think, maybe repaint over it.  
What We Did: Burn the entire area to the ground in attempt that, eventually, was in vain for reasons that will become abundantly clear to you later on.

So, this is just a small sample of the first couple of days that we attempted to challenge the Pack's role as top dogs of construction upon the Island of Sodor. To be honest, I think even Gordon knew it was going to be over one that very first day, but his pride was beating his common sense into the ground with quite brutal strength, and so he refused to back down.

I bring this next section up in more detail instead of the more clipped notes that I later had Sand write down for me because I think it pretty much states, in one brief, crisp scene, the futility of most of our schemes. To set the scene, we were discussing how it was that Arthur had a spotless record despite the fact that he had somehow managed to set the swimming pool on fire (A very long story that really can't be explained in words) and whether or not we should gently suggest that he go back to the fishing village.

So we're talking on this subject, and then all of a sudden, James remarks, out of the goddamn blue "I've been thinking. You know what the shed needs? A computer!"

I remind you of two things, if you don't get the stupid of this situation.

1: This is a SHED. For ENGINES. This is not James suggesting we give the workmen access to the internet in the area that has been set aside for them, this is him giving a fighter jet to a caveman, basically.

2: We haven't even put the bloody stilts in the ground yet.

So, we try and dissuade him, and to be fair, he did back down.

Then Gordon chimes in with the immortal words "What a good idea, James! Let's do it!" and since Gordon is like a dog with a frisbee when it comes to his ideas, we couldn't go back on them.

I repeat. So far, we've built exactly minus one things. I say minus one because we ended up destroying one already established thing just to make it even harder for us.

Back to the notes that I took at the time, now, for a general idea of what the next two weeks were like. To clarify, we spent an entire month doing this construction, and if that seems like an incredibly fast time to construct a building, there's a reason for that.

Problem 4: Our stilts sink into the sinkhole/swamp/hell-pit differently on one side.  
Logical Solution: Make sure stilts are evened out.  
What We Did: Say "Eh, screw it" and begin building so that one half of the shed is now on a very strange slope.

Problem 5: Gordon brings to our attention that we don't have hard hats on.  
Logical Solution: Move on with life.  
What We Did: Spend three days waiting for hard-hats made specially for engines to arrive, by which point Toby was willing to kill himself if only to break the dullness.

I shall skip ahead somewhat now, to the very end of our endeavor. I could very easily have made an entire book based upon this one project of Gordon's, and list each of the seven hundred and fifty seven problems we experienced minutely. There were probably more, but I'm being very kind to Gordon on this account. The only reason I don't list them in this book is because I actually want to talk about more events.

By now, we were all thoroughly sick of the entire thing. Arthur had bogged off back to the Fishing Village in the middle of Hardhatgate, we hadn't needed to push him off the ship, he'd done a three point turn mid air instead. It was getting so genuinely stressful that Emily had briefly taken up the ancient art of using a peace pipe to get high. It was a temporary thing, even if for days afterwards the sheds did have more smoke in it than an entire convention of smokers.

Gordon hurried up to the large turntable (having been installed, along with the lighting for the place. By now, the skeleton of the shed was in fine fettle) and grinned. "Great news, guys! Doors are on their way, so we should be able to knock this out, without stopping, in three days!"

By this point, myself, Toby, Emily and James would have gone pole dancing as long as this nightmare could have ended, so we went at it (Not the pole dancing, the building work) like hounds. We assisted with the mixing of cement to stick bricks into place, we hammered away at anything that needed a hammering, we used said cement to fill up the walls...

Two days later, we stepped back and admired our work. Impressively, when we all worked together, it seemed to look rather nice. The lights working meant that we got to see everything as the visiting engines would. It was quite nice, let me tell you.

We were just congratulating each other, and planning to create 'I worked on a shed with Gordon and all I got was this lousy T-shirt' shirts when Toby spotted a rather interesting little flaw in our plan.

"Where are the doors?"

That's right. We had sealed ourselves in a very big block of concrete.

...

And once we'd broken out (inadvertently destroying four weeks worth of hard work in the process, as most of the shed went back into the sinkhole. Again, perhaps building it on a slant wasn't the best idea) we decided to cut our losses and file most of the money problems we'd have under the surrounding lawsuits regarding the Church of James incident.

Still had to pawn off the Wharf though.

So the moral of the story? I don't know, don't ever listen to Gordon? Engines are not construction vehicles? Bob the Builder clearly has a harder job than you?

Whatever it is, you won't find me telling you the moral! I'm going drinking!


	7. In Which Bodies Hit the Floor

It's the season of spooky! And to celebrate this, any Tales told in this time will be seasonally themed! First off, we've a nice one from a subject that I often enjoy seeing spoofed, the slasher movie. All will make some sort of sense by the end.

...

 _She ran and ran and ran as best as she could._

 _Steve...Carl...Jenna...B'Dawg...ALL DEAD!_

 _How would she survive without them?! And more importantly, how would she survive without...her head!? For there behind her was the horrible Masked Murderer with An Axe and a Chainsaw! Truly, after seven killing sprees, he should have been spent. But no! His lust for blood was too much!_

 _For now the Masked Murderer with An Axe and A Chainsaw had come to...MIAMI BEACH!_

"BOO! BOO!"

"THIS IS AWFUL!"

"PUT SOMETHING GOOD ON!"

The engines were rather peeved. It was October, the month of spooky ghost stories and terrifying tales of terror that would send them all into a paranoid wreck until mid-November. Percy'd probably be up to something funny, getting scared off his wheels by some random thing or another, that was always fun. And instead, here they were, stuck on a marathon of Sodor's own slasher series known as the Scratch films.

So far they'd had: Scratch, Scratch II, Scratch: Something Wicked, The Return of Scratch, Son of Scratch, The Return of the Return of Scratch, Scratch's Curse, Scratch In Da Hood and now, Scratch On Vacation. The first film had been great. The second one was fun. The third was a decent attempt at breaking away from the formula. The rest were just a long sliding downhill slope of awful.

They still hadn't got to the final four films, being: Scratch in Jail, Scratch IN SPACE, Scratch (2007) and Daughter of the Son of Scratch. They were just...baffling.

"You know, it's not as if it's even that funny in an ironic way, is it?" James muttered. "I mean, Busta Rhymes? Seriously? Oh, look, he's making out with someone now. Honestly, waking up in bed with Busta Rhymes next to you must be the most shocking experience."

"You know, what it is it about people stretching out franchises to fleece as much money as they can from them? I mean, I know that money is the end all and be all, but still." Edward tried to settle down, but the Vicarstown Sheds were rather uncomfortable at the moment.

"Ye're not wrong. I mean look at Halloween!" agreed Emily.

"Or Friday the 13th" added Percy.

"And Nightmare on Elm's Street." muttered Thomas.

"Not to mention Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Child's Play, Night of the Living Dead, Silent Night Deadly Night, the Puppet Master, Anaconda, the Amityville Horror, Saw, Underworld and of course, Happy Madison." said Toby, who was surprisingly enough a rather big fan of horror movies. It was rather fun to watch, in his opinion.

Duck frowned. "Happy Madison? That's the Sandler company, right? They don't make horror movies."

"No? You try watching Grown Ups 1 or 2 and remain sane." Toby shuddered.

"I've always wondered which one of us would last the longest in a slasher movie." Henry remarked. "I mean, who'd die first, if he or she would adhere to the rules of the genre."

"Have you always wondered that, Henry?" said Gordon, witheringly.

"Er...no. Just wanted to be part of the conversation."

"Ach, ye know who'd be the first to die?" Donald remarked.

"James?" asked Douglas.

"James."

"WHA-I WOULD NOT!" James was insulted. "I'd last longer than you, straw for brains!"

"Ha! As if." Rosie grinned. "I give it, what, ten minutes?"

"Five, tops." argued Neville.

"You're both being very optimistic." smirked Gordon.

And just as James was about to argue about how he would be the last one standing out of all of them...the lights went out.

"Oh, bother." said Thomas.

"Well, looks like someone's going to have to go out there and see what the problem is. Maybe see if they can't restart it." Edward sighed.

There was a long silence and everyone looked rather expectantly at the blue engine. Edward would have folded his arms, if he had any. He didn't, so he settled for closing his eyes and refusing to move. This lasted three minutes, until at last...

"Oh, fine, I'll go, you lazy sods." Muttering rebelliously to himself, Edward departed the shed and headed off towards the goods shed, which was where the generator was contained. "God damn lazy eyed bastards, if I wasn't such a good and kind person I'd throw them out myself. Ah. Okay then. Right, so...I'm an engine, which means I'm not exactly that good at complicated electricity, so me coming out here has been confirmed to be a complete waste of time. Good, glad to know that we're keeping that streak alive."

He thought. "Now, perhaps if I just give it a little bit of this-" And so saying, he rolled forward, bumping into the generator. There was a loud whirring noise, and it flickered back into life. "Okay, so, note to self, call fitter in the morning."

He turned around.

And promptly got knifed right in the head.

...

"So, do you think Edward's gone off to sulk or to get drunk?"

"The two aren't mutually exclusive, you know."

"Fair point."

"How do you think the Clangers procreate?"

All conversation ground to a halt as everyone turned their attention to Percy, who looked around in bafflement. "What? Don't tell me you've never thought of it! I mean, do you think they have genitals, or-"

"Right, that's it, I suggest we all get out of here and get some night air. Clearly we've all been cooped up in here for far too long, and Percy will just be the first of us to crack under the pressure!" Gordon's statement was met with much agreement. They left just in the middle of the movie, where Scratch was stalking his victims while wearing his patented weasel mask.

"MY GOD! GET BEHIND ME, TWISHANDRA!"

"GIRL, YOU GOTTA BEAT HIS ASS LIKE AN EGG!" declared the token sassy black woman of the group. Neville, who was the last one left in the sheds, decided that he didn't need fresh air, and thought that staying in was a far better idea. Using a handy bit of tech that allowed him to eat popcorn, he took a fair amount into his mouth. Don't take that out of context.

"Oh terrific," he bemoaned as the resident horror expert of the group tripped and was seperated from her chums "So now she'll have to get up and run away on her own, and just when she thinks that she's got away, boom, magically teleportng serial killer appears from out of nowhere! God, I hate that cliche, isn't that right, mysterious shadowy figure wearing a skull mask?"

He paused. "Wait, something doesn't feel right about that-"

The last thing he saw was a massive coal shovel right into his face.

The others were outside, cheerfully and blissfully ignorant of Neville's untimely death. Gordon and Henry were chatting about how clearly Scratch (2007) was a terrible remake that traded away any suspense for gratituous shots of T&A and swearing, Emily and Rosie were playing the game of Snog, Marry, Screw, Thomas was avoiding Rosie (Just in case) and James was pondering whether or not he would actually survive a night with a slasher.

"Yeah, see, I know that it's a legitimate question, Percy, but perhaps if you'd prefaced it with something a little...easier, maybe then they wouldn't have reacted so strongly." Toby yawned. "Well, you lot can party all night long if you want to, I'll go back in and get a quick kip. Wonder if they've reached the part where Scratch runs through the nudist colony. That part's always my favorite."

He was gone but a second before a loud shout cut through the relaxed calm. Everyone turned back to look at Toby, who staggered out looking quite pale. "IT'S NEVILLE! HE'S...HE'S..."

"Eaten all the popcorn again!?" James tutted "I told him that his figure is going to hate him later on in life."

"DEAD!"

Somewhere, someone played the piano rather dramatically.

"Er, when you say dead, do you actually mean-?"

"Shovel through the eye. Pretty dead if you ask me."

"I just thought I'd bring it up."

"Hang about-" remarked Duck "-wasn't there a death scene like that in one of the Scratch movies?"

"Son of Scratch. Killer's located in a mine, grabs first thing that comes to mind and...splat. Lots of blood, gore, freaks out the kiddies each time. Why?" Henry laughed. "Oh I see! You think that there's some copycat killer on the loose who is emulating the Scratch movies!? What rot! Besides, if he was doing it, he'd do it in a far more flashy manner, wouldn't he?"

At which point, someone lobbed a molotov cocktail out of the shed. It landed inside Toby's cab. Within four seconds he was completely alight, screaming all the while as he ran about flapping like a chicken.

"HOLY SHIT THAT WAS COOL!"

"Focus, Percy!" snapped Thomas.

"AAAAARGH IT BURNS IT BURNS AAAAARGH!"

Everyone promptly screamed and made a run for the exit. Unfortunately, since half of them were on the turntable, this resulted in much confusion and delay. Only this time, it was FATAL.

"OH GOD WHY AM I THE JOCK WHO GETS KILLED OFF REALLY EARLY!?" wailed Gordon as the killer stabbed him in the brain area with his axe. Swinging around, pulling a little bit of Gordon's flesh out with it, he strode off in the direction of the pub.

...

"Okay, so who wants to go out and have a looksee what's going on?"

"NOT ME." declared everyone. Henry growled in annoyance, and sort of facebutted the nearest engine (James) trapped in the massive rat-king like squash in the generator room.

"It's shockingly quiet out there. What do ye think is going on?" Emily asked.

"Maybe he's gone home?" said Thomas, hopefully.

"Toby's still on fire out there, you know."

"OH GOD IT BURNS WHERE'S THE WATER!?"

Suddenly, there was a rather strange sound. Strange in how out of place it was in all of the chaos and fear and panic and general mayhem that had gone on in the last ten minutes. It was the sound of-

"ICE CREAM!" shouted Percy. "I SCREAM, YOU SCREAM, WE ALL SCREAM FOR ICE CREAM! WHEEEE!" And so saying, he forced his way through the enginepile and rushed towards the ice cream van.

He reached it and lightly bumped into it. "Hey! Open up! I'd like a orange lolly and a strawberry ice cream with sprinkles, please!"

The ice cream man leapt through the window, ice cream cone hiding his knife and rammed both cone and knife into Percy's throat. Everyone screamed, not for ice cream, but in horror. Save for Thomas, who merely remarked "That is an incredibly elaborate set-up for one single kill!" before he started screaming too.

Scratch advanced upon the remaining engines, who all quavered and quivered and did other things beginning with 'q' that I can't think of right now. At last, one voice rang out.

"ENOUGH!"

Everyone looked to Donald (Or possbily Douglas, in the dark it was hard to tell) who forced his way through. "ARE WE ENGINES, OR ARE WE MICE?!"

"MICE!" shouted the others "WE'RE ALL MICE, WE LOVE CHEESE, WE DON'T LIKE CATS, PLEASE IGNORE THEM!"

"ACH! YE ARE ALL A BUNCH OF LILY LIVERED JESSIES!" Donald drew a sword from a magical area known only as hammerspace, clutched it between his teeth and let out a bellow that sounded like "FOR THE HONOR OF SCOTLAND THA BRAVE!" but sounded more muffled because, well, sword in mouth, and charged, followed rapidly by the enthused Douglas and Emily.

Unfortunately, this heroic stand went pear shaped almost immediately as Donald had clearly forgot that he had a sword in his mouth, and that he had effectively handed Scratch a kill on a platter. Emily was enraged, so enraged that she threw Douglas to him while she tried to make her escape.

She didn't get far. Douglas put up shockingly little fight, as per the rules of slasher movies, and therefore was dead before she'd even gotten past the points. One chainsaw shot through her cab later, and Emily was deader than a dead thing.

"Wow, we are dropping like flies, aren't we?!"

"See, this is why the Scots shouldn't have independence!"

"Now is not the time for your weird politics, Oliver!"

"When is the time, Duck? WHEN-"

...

"So, why was it necessary to shove Oliver into the path of the serial killer?" asked Duck as they rested inside the shed, waiting for the killer to show.

"It just was." remarked Thomas, simply.

"THAT'S IT! I HAVE HAD IT WITH THESE MOTHERF**kING SLASHERS IN MY MOTHERF**KING SHED!" Rosie bellowed. "It's time for me to woman up, to become just like SIGOURNEY WEAVER! JAMIE LEE CURTIS!" She frowned. "I'm going to need a lot of leather and darker paint."

"Okay, pun not intended, but is it just me or this going off the rails fast even by our standards?" James asked aloud. He paused "Also, Henry appears to be dead."

"WHAT?!" shrieked Duck "HOW?!"

"Well judging by the fact that he appears to be dribbling fish, I'd say that while we were knocking Oliver outside and running like maniacs to the shed, the killer got in and stuffed him full of fish until he choked on a wishbone." James looked solemn for a moment, then grinned "On the plus side, MAKE THAT ANOTHER ONE I'VE OUTLASTED!"

"You're a prick, James."

"A prick who is going to survive!" James laughed maniacally, having clearly gone off the edge somewhat.

And then there was trouble.

Well, even more so than usual.

Toby had, all this time, been running about wildly like a headless chicken that was also on fire and in extreme pain, screaming himself hoarse and in unbearable agony. Quite by accident, he ended up being switched onto the points back into the generator room, and...well...

To say that there was a terrific bang would be a understatement. A vast one.

The explosion ended up feeding back into the shed. Glass from the overhead lights shattering rained down upon the remaining engines.

"GAH! NO! MY BEAUTIFUL FACE!" wailed Thomas. The killer chose this time to throw his chainsaw through the window, through Thomas's open mouth and all the way through the other side, coming out of his bunker. The Star Billing Bastard was gone. Dead.

Things got worse when the exploding lights ended up causing a massive fire.

"OH GOD IT BURNS!" screamed Duck. Usually he would have been the one to take down the killer, but at this point, he was more preoccupied with putting out the fires...of LOVE! And also the part of him that was covered in flames, as well. He died like most third to last horror victims, off screen to establish the stakes had never been higher.

James let out a very undignified scream as, through the flames, the killer stalked his way over to him. He looked around, for anything he could use as a weapon, anything at all.

Then he remembered something. "Oh yeah, I'm an engine! I can just crush him beneath my wheels!" and rushed towards said killer, who then did something very, very unexpected.

He moved slightly to the left. James shut his eyes as he plowed directly into the wall. He whimpered as the killer advanced forwards, raising his axe up to the high heavens, ready to strike down and ruin the splendid red engine's face permanently, when-

"GET AWAY FROM HIM YOU SON OF A BITCH!"

The killer turned, just in time to get run over by Rosie, who had somehow managed to transform her looks entirely into something that looked like KISS and Black Sabbath's illegitimate child. The killer got back up, moaning somewhat.

"HA! DIDN'T SEE THAT COMING, DID YOU!?" Rosie whooped, and then ran forward a second time, smacking the killer up into the air. "WHOOP WHOOP RAISE THE ROOF!"

James was in no mood to be raising the roof, or anything other than a pained moan of sadness. As he pulled himself out of the imprint left on the wall, he shook himself...and then noticed Scratch's chainsaw left embedded in the wall. Quietly, he began to puff towards it.

"HA! HOW'D YOU LIKE-OW!"

Unfortunately, Rosie had gotten too caught up in the moment, and it had given Scratch time to get up and stab her through the head with the knife. He staggered forwards, clutched the knife...

And got stabbed right in the back by his own chainsaw. He gasped, and turned back to see James, holding the chainsaw handle with his mouth, looking so smug that were it converted to an energy form, it would power the entire Earth for the next thousand years with no problem.

"Now, let's see who is behind that mask!" James, as you may have noticed, was rather chipper and ignoring the fact that many of his friends were either dead or dying. Gingerly, he pulled the chainsaw out and used it to brush aside the already broken mask to reveal...

Drum roll please.

SIR TOPHAM HATT!

"Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa-" said James, in the tone of one who has had the universe shatter into millions of tiny pieces right in his head. At which point the Sugar Plum Fairy danced in with Marlon Brando, Clint Eastwood appeared dressed as a Valkyrie and the dead began to rise. It was at this point that James came to a inescapable conclusion.

"I'M BLOODY DREAMING?!"

...

And then he woke up.

"Huh" he remarked. He let out a sigh of relief, laughed at the TV screen showing the twenty four hour marathon and turned his head to see Busta Rhymes just exiting bed.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR-"

...

"Some engines-" remarked Edward, as James continued to scream in his sleep "-just can't stomach good old fashioned slasher movies." This was the last word on the subject as popcorn was crunched, drinks were consumed and stupid and cheesy slasher films were devoured by rapt eyes.


	8. In Which A Grouch Steals Christmas

Hello dear readers and reviewers, it's that time of year  
Where having consumed just the right amount of beer  
It is customary for people to rip off the great Doctor Seuss  
And this year, it's my turn, my crappy rhyming has been let loose!

I hope you enjoy this seasonal offering  
It was made with love, and joy, and a bit of bloody suffering.  
This is a one time only deal, so just stick with us if you please  
Forgive my rhyming skills, and who knows, you might have a wheeze!

* * *

Christmas was coming, as it often does.  
Many celebrate this by looting, and running from the fuzz.  
On Sodor, on this particular tale  
All the vehicles in the town, be it road or rail:

Were in great spirits, save for the odd grumble  
And the suggestion of what to get did cause such a rumble  
That with no hint of irony or tempting fate  
The Fat Controller did decree that all would have to wait!

For there was work to be done, he argued rather proudly  
Though his speech was drowned by a chorus that proclaimed loudly:  
"Piss off, Fatso! Tis Christmas, you foolish prat!  
We're going to enjoy ourselves, so remove from your arse your hat!"

Yet still, did they continue on with their work and force.  
Snow was shoveled, mail delivered and in due course  
Did come the time of gift buying and great choices to be made  
Such as a debate about James appreciating the works of the Marquis De Sade.

"Damn it all!" cried Gordon. "This whole bloody season!  
Why do we celebrate it? Why? I can't think of the reason!  
The passengers are shits, and there's Black Friday aplenty!  
Just today, the average hospitalization toll numbered twenty!"

"Ah-" said Edward knowingly "-It's be worth in a few weeks  
When we're all filled with goodwill and cheer, we'll party like sheiks!"  
For every engine on the NWR liked Christmas a great deal  
But the Grouch...who lived in the Dieselworks, felt a third wheel!

For the grouch hated Christmas, the whole bloody palaver  
Don't ask us why, he just would have taken a bath of lava.  
Year after year, he'd put up with the same load of crap  
Listening to the same speeches filled to the brim with sap.

Perhaps it was because he had the temperament of Eeyore.  
Or possibly because his wheel trimmings were sore.  
But I think that the biggest reason, left until last  
Was that he thought that his brain was two sizes too vast.

But whatever the Freudian Excuse, pick which you please  
He sat in his Dieselworks, acting the sleaze.  
Staring down, with a horrible grouch grimace  
He never got how the other engines got this sickness

"When you think we've reached the lowest-" He snapped with a leer  
"Tomorrow is Christmas, AGAIN, it's practically here!  
Can't they see-" He ranted, "-that they're all being twits!?  
The steamies I get, but the diesels? They too have lost their wits!"

"But Diesel!" cried Paxton, the Grouch's loyal chum.  
"Surely peace and goodwill is not something that's dumb!  
The Sudrians all across the Island all cheer  
Not least because how much doth flow the beer!"

Diesel scowled and glared at the blooming great ninny.  
He was like Percy, but a diesel, and far more mini.  
Why he kept him around, he was none the wiser  
He'd have had better luck with Wilhelm, the Kaiser.

"Paxton, you dolt! You've fallen for the scam!  
Christmas, peace and goodwill? Ha! You poor little lamb!  
For even now, James, Henry and Gordon together  
Will be whining and moaning about the rotten weather!

They just want their own presents, the noisy brats!  
I swear, when James and Gordon have a bit, they got at it like cats!  
And then Percy will eat all the food and be sick  
And Edward will cry into his drink, the poor old hick.

Meanwhile, Winter Holidays are constantly fought over  
Thomas and Emily can be heard from Land's End to the Cliffs of Dover!  
And while this is going on, they'll unwrap their gifts  
For then they shall complain and be mightily miffed!

The Capitalist so and so's, they're all about the trash!"  
"But Diesel, aren't you awaiting the delivery of hash?"  
"Paxton, shut up, do you realize the perils of rhyming?  
I'd never do this normally, it takes excellent timing!

For then they shall gather round the tree, that old bloody cliche  
And they'll start singing sweet songs that give us toothaches til May!  
I can't take it, I won't take it, I've had it up to here!  
To hell with Christmas, peace and all that festive cheer!"

The Grouch growled and gritted his teeth  
He wailed and snarled and shook like a leaf  
And he was about to throw Paxton into the cliff  
When through his memories, an idea did shift!

A wonderful idea, by all of his plot  
An awful one too, for which he should have been shot.  
A wonderfully awful idea did make him grin  
And Paxton, not for the first time, wondered if he'd drunk all the gin.

"AH-HA!" cried the Grouch "OH HO, HE-HE!"  
"Diesel, are you off your rocker? Shall I fetch you tea?"  
"I have it, I shall stop Christmas from coming in style!  
And you, Paxton, shall assist me with this plan of most guile!"

And thus saying so, he shunted Paxton back  
Into the Dieselworks, where he thought of his attack.  
"I shall steal Christmas, right under their noses!  
And it shall split them apart, like the Red Sea, cause I'm Moses!

I'm make sure I'm dressed to the nines when I hit the town  
Like Father Christmas, that fat bearded clown!  
I shall descend from Vicarstown, I'll be dripping with class  
And thus I shall take Christmas from that number one blue ass!"

"But Diesel-" exclaimed Paxton "-how wickedly devious!  
Surely you can't mean this, there can't be a part of you that's serious!"  
"Shut up Paxton, and let my crew get on with the painting  
When those engines wake up tomorrow, they'll not be able to stop fainting!"

 **You're an arsehole, Mr Grouch!**  
 **This song's gonna take it's toll.**  
 **You make me want to throw up**  
 **And drown in the toilet bowl**  
 **Mr Grouch!**

 **At the moment, it's even debatable**  
 **Whether or not you've got a SOUL!**

 **You're overreacting, Mr Grouch.**  
 **You should really get a life!**  
 **Your gears are rusty as all hell**  
 **And your insides cause only strife**  
 **Mr Grouch!**

 **God, I'd really hate to see you shipped**  
 **I'D feel so sorry for his poor WIFE!**

 **This song's going to get boring, Mr Grouch.**  
 **Cause who doesn't know how bad you think?**  
 **You're as competent as a broken bottle**  
 **And you've driving me to drink.**  
 **Mr Grouch!**

 **You know, this song is sort of dragging, really, so let's stop it right now**  
 **And that goes for Diesel's unholy STINK!**

I hope, dear reader, you appreciate the effort that the singer went to  
He's currently passed out, with a strained voice and a need to go to the loo!  
But anyway, back to our story, for the Grouch had now did complete  
That plan oh so devious, that he'd put into place on this night filled with sleet.

For he had designed a great set of Santy Claus garment  
Which from all stores at once much commence the disbarment.  
And on his head he had stuck, through some blu track and tat  
A bright red, barely smelly at all, genuine Christmas hat.

With his plan nearly complete, he searched for a steed  
Strangely enough, he wasn't willing at all to concede  
Despite the lack of reindeer, in this British climate  
As he dragged Paxton over, oh that big rotten tyrant!

One accident with the glue gun later and Paxton was ready  
Though the several blows to his face had made him a little unsteady  
And so off they went through that black inky night  
And oh me, oh my, oh dear, what a bloody awful sight.

Through the countryside they rattled, the Grouch screaming at high pitch  
For it turned out that Paxton couldn't slow down on the icy rails, karma's a bitch.  
Til at last, they reached the Narrow Gauge Sheds, and Diesel caught his breath  
And wondered whether or not the night would end with his very painful death.

All the wee engines of the hills were tucked up asleep  
Though both Duncan and Sir Handel had had a good weep.  
For they were aware that they would most likely get no gifts  
And at this, the two troublemakers were certainly quite miffed.

The tree was right there, bright, proud and tall  
Aside from all the pine needles in freefall  
Without a word the Grouch started work right then and there  
Taking baubles, tinsel, ornaments and presents without a single care.

Paxton watched with shock and with disgrace  
As the Grouch cackled and pranced all over the place!  
Soon they were nearly finished, and the Grouch did softly cheer  
When all of a sudden, a voice spoke up, that could reduce one to shedding a tear!

"Father Christmas! Oh my goodie goodie gumdrops, is it thee?!  
Of all the good little girl and boy engines, you've chosen to visit me?  
But what are you doing, with that fine stout bit of bark?  
Oh lordie, oh luvvie, Duncan swore he got it legally from the park!"

Yes, it was Little Peter Sam, the smallest in the shed.  
And though in the other engines, optimism was dead  
Peter Sam was still as happy and as innocent as the day his plans were drew!  
He truly had the heart of an awfully young child. And the brain of one too.

And though both Paxton and Diesel's teeth began to chatter  
A rather smart notion of how to escape did come to the latter.  
"My dear Sir Handel-" "Peter Sam-" "Hush it kid, please!  
You've got it all wrong, do you take me for a sleaze?

For there is a problem with this tree, oh, not to the naked eye  
But there is woodlice infesting this fine, stout pine and I cry  
This tree is need, of the elves and their tender care  
I'll drop it back here, after I've taken it to be fixed over there!"

So stupid was Peter Sam, and Paxton too, that they did burst into tears  
And a very nervous Diesel, having successfully assuaged their fears  
Did assist the wee one to the water tower to get a large drink  
As soon as he fell to sleep, the Grouch did roll back from the brink

And with a whoosh and a wheesh, and a few words far more rude  
He and Paxton made their escape with the tree and a confident attitude  
And so did start the Great Christmas theft, with no small amount of issues  
Many a lie the Fake Father Christmas had to spin, all of which reduced Paxton to tears.

 **It's a reprise, Mr Grouch!**  
 **I'm running out of lines!**  
 **You have a heart that's morally bankrupt**  
 **And you're late on all it's fines**  
 **Mr Grouch!**

 **Given the choice between a minefield and your company**  
 **I'd sooner say "BRING ON THE MINES!"**

 **Can I tell you, Mr Grouch**  
 **That you're making me sniff glue!?**  
 **Your sneer contains rancid rat cadavers**  
 **And you remind me of a loo**  
 **Mr Grouch!**

 **Given the descriptions I've given you, I can see only one use for you**  
 **As the forbidden ingredient in a witch's brew!**

 **So let's finish now, Mr Grouch.**  
 **I've discussed all that's at your core!**  
 **You say you're full of surprises but**  
 **I'm afraid I've seen it all before**  
 **Mr Grouch!**

 **So give me my money you assholes, I'm done with this shit**  
 **And Diesel, you I truly, deeply, really do deplore!**

As the sun began to rise, the diesels did return home  
Towards the Dieselworks, with the Grouch grinning like a malevolent gnome  
Like a gremlin, with glee, he set the trucks up in line  
And prepared to destroy them, with a fire that was quite fine.

"I've done it, Paxton, I've finally come out on tops!  
And by now the sun should be waking up those foolish fops!  
They'll eye their empty sheds, I know just what they'll do!  
A moment's silence, and then an all mighty roar of "Boohoo!"

And that-" said the Grouch "-is something that no one can miss!  
Oh get a grip dear Paxton, don't sulk, you're taking the piss!"  
And so with glee in his soul and malice in his grin  
He hurried to the opening to listen, with a tumbler full of gin.

And soon the Grouch did hear something, over the hills  
But for a moment, he wondered if he needed to take his sane pills  
For this was no wail, no scream, no roar or arguments snappy  
In fact, if we were to describe it, it was really quite...happy!

For the twits in the Island were singing a cheerful song  
So cheerful in fact, that at first it was feared that they'd all taken a bong!  
They sang with great glee and great spirit, that is true  
And they didn't even hesitate upon seeing the lack of presents, they knew what to do.

And the Grouch, right next to a gleeful Paxton, in the snow  
Stood baffled and dismayed "Well this really does blow!  
There's no bloody food, or beer, or presents from the heart!  
I'd ask you for help, Paxton, but you're not bloody smart!"

"Maybe-" said Paxton "-they've thought of something you've not before!  
I know that your attitude to this season and celebration is really sore!  
But maybe Christmas doesn't come from a stupid discount store!  
Maybe, just perhaps, Christmas means a little bit more."

"...Nah!" said the Grouch, with a dismissive blast  
"Well, even if they're being stupid, they'll change their tune fast!  
Into the fire, go it all! Make it burn bright-"  
But as he did turn to look, he did receive such a massive fright!

For Paxton had scurried off, with the trucks full of the loot  
And heading towards Knapford, the entire night rendered MOOT!  
"OH BLOW!" he did cry, though maybe a bit stronger  
For he hadn't realized that Paxton would be pushed no longer!

And then the true meaning of Christmas shined through  
For the Grouch cracked under the peer pressure of TEN Grouches, plus two!  
And so, as they arrived, Paxton did apologize to the engines most bereft!  
And he, he, the Grouch, did get arrested immediately and sent to jail for theft.

While Paxton and the others did have a blast on that Christmas Day  
Pulling crackers and wearing Christmas hats and toasting each other along the way.  
The Grouch would be heard to remark "Bah Humbug! I've learnt the meaning of the season  
til next year, where A hack writer'll make me go through it again for some bloody reason!"

* * *

So to all of you readers, young and old  
I hope you will not think me too bold  
In wishing you a better year all right!  
Merry Christmas to all, and to all, a good night!


	9. In Which A Photo is Taken

"Okay people, let's try and get this over with today!"

The eight engines stood with smiles plastered on their faces so tightly that one could reasonably assume that they had been painted on. The director nodded and moved off

"You know-" said Edward through the gritted teeth of an engine trying desperately to maintain the facade "-these publicity photos are getting more and more needless elaborate by the minute."

"I could have sworn that the last time with the bungee cord was the height of ridiculousness." muttered Toby in agreement. "But this is just ridiculous."

It was the coldest day of the year, which was impressive given how shitty the weather on the Island of Sodor could get get. On this day, the Fat Controller had ordered the 'Steam Team' together to take a publicity still for the upcoming series (Number 11, for those wondering). They had arrived at the sheds not expecting to find anything other than a slightly miffed looking camera crew and some drinks to warm them up.

What they had found was what could charitably called a Winter Wonderland. The rails had been covered with ice that clung to the metal like limpets to the side of a boat. The director had told them this was to make them look as though they were flying through the air or that they had such poise and grace like an ice skater. Henry had told him where to stick his poise and grace. It had been an interesting start to the day.

And now, one hour into the shoot, there they were, waiting for the camera man to arrive with the latest model of camera.

"So, Thomas, how is Mr Snowman doing?"

"I swear, James, these scripts they send us! Mr Bloody Snowman! I'm beginning to think the writer hated me when they were younger and wanted me to look as daft as possible!" Thomas shot a glare at Gordon. "Don't say anything like "Oh, it's not that hard!" Gordon, I know your ways!"

"I wasn't going to say anything!" lied Gordon.

"Ye think that's bad!" snapped Emily. "Have ye seen how the scripts make ME look? I look like a stuck up bitch!"

"And that's different from reality, how-?"

"Oh piss off, James."

"Yeah, you have no room to say stuff like that." Henry mimicked for a moment. "Vain but lots of fun? Oh yeah, they got the last part down to a tee! You're so much fun to be around, James!"

"Calm down everyone, it's cold and we're all a little bit angry." Edward looked over to the camera men. "How long will this take?"

"Once the camera gets here, about five minutes? We only want one photo from you!"

"You see! Everything will be a-okay!" Edward was aware that he was suffering from a massive dose of suicidal overconfidence, but he just really wanted for this day to end so that he could go back to the shed and watch Power Rangers with Neville and Molly.

...

Soon, the camera arrived, and the director had it set up. Everyone put their happy faces back on again, and prepared for the photograph.

"Quiet on set! And three...two...one-"

The flash briefly blinded everyone. James and Gordon muttered something about how they should really work out a way to reduce said flash whenever they wanted a photo taken, and Edward spent the next few minutes referring to a wall as 'Toby'.

"Okay, okay, let's get a look- Oh, damn it!"

"What?" gasped Thomas as sight returned to him.

"The bloody clouds were blocking out the sun! It's ruined!" The director pulled off his shades and threw them to the ground, before bellowing aloud "CURSE YOU SKY! WHEN WILL WE REACH AN ACCORD WITH YOU!?"

"So...take the shot again sir?"

"Take the shot again sir, indeed!"

Everyone groaned. They slipped their smiles back on, and waited. It took a long time for the clouds to move to a sutiable point where the director was pleased with their positions. The engines began to fidget.

"Three...two..."

And then, Gordon began humming something under his breath.

"Once an engine attached to a train,  
Was afraid of a few drops of rain."

"ONE!"

"YOU BASTARD!" And Henry somehow managed to headbutt Gordon...right as the flash went off. Gordon would have been seeing stars, had it not been for the fact that the flash had also rendered him unable to see.

This photograph, by the way, was a beaut. Henry had it framed later and put up in his berth.

...

"I hope you're bloody happy with yourself!"

"I am, thanks, James!"

"OH PISS OFF-"

"Just...smile!" Edward was beginning to sound desperate. "Listen, I don't care if anyone makes references to safety valves, or jammed whistles, or falling down a mine or anything like that. Let's just take the picture and go!"

"QUIET ON THE SET!"

Smiles back on!

"Three...two...No, no, it's too much!"

"WHAT NOW?!" shouted Toby, his nerves having officially been frazzled. By the gnashing of teeth, it was clear that Emily and Percy weren't too far behind him on that front. The director shook his head.

"Sorry, but you're all in the wrong positions!"

"The BLOODY hell is wrong with our positions?! What, do you want us squatting down?!"

"No need to get course, Gordon." muttered Henry. Gordon shot the big green engine a glare that was returned with equal force.

"Okay, take ten everyone, while we move the engines about!"

...

"There we are! All right lads, and lass, how do you feel?"

"Like this is a huge waste of time!" Percy snarled. Thomas had been moved onto the center of the turntable, while Percy, James and Toby were each in sheds to the side of him. On the other lines that led elsewhere lay the four remaining tender engines, all looking equally as miserable.

"Nonsense! Now this is far more what I had in mind!" The Director stepped back and took one last look. He was satisfied. "All right, get those smiles ready!" This time, the engines tried to go for sedate smiles, the kind that weren't obviously faked for the camera. They succeeded...mostly. Thomas looked as though he was trying desperately to convince himself that this was a good idea.

"And three..."

He didn't even reach two before an icicle fell from the roof of the shed door and hit James square on the head. Truth be told, it was more shock than anything that caused him to throw a minor fit and refuse to do anymore until his head was examined properly.

Edward wondered if he could Google how to kill himself subtly, without anyone else noticing or stealing his ideas.

...

"You know, this is taking longer than I thought it would."

"No shit! ...Sir." Thomas added, primarily to cover his own bunker in case Hatt went nuts on him. In the corner, Edward whimpered softly as hour number five rolled around with no sign of James and with the camera crew suggesting that they break for the day.

Sounds good, right?

Until you realize that that means they would have to do this all over again the next day.

...

At last, they took their places. The camera was ready. "Three...two...one!" There was a loud click, and a flash...and nothing happened. The photo was taken, everything stayed in it's place. The engines did not open their mouths just yet though. What did the man in charge think?

The eight breathed a sigh of relief, as the director checked the camera and nodded his approval. They had just begun to move off when one of the camera-men began to move the camera back into it's casing.

It didn't end well. Unless you were a sadist who counted the destruction of one very expensive camera to be hysterical.

The eight engines began to run as fast as they could towards anywhere that wasn't here. No amount of money in the world was going to get them to do another take.

This was one lesson well learned. From there on, only normal and traditional photographs were taken.

For the most part.

But that, as they say, is another story.


	10. In Which Rules are Revealed

It was in 2081, when the embers of World War Whatever the Hell It Was had only just started to rest, when an archaeological team set foot upon the Island of Sodor in hope of finding something.

That something was the Fat Controller's liquor cabinet, for they were all raging alcoholics who couldn't function in normal society any more. They felt that it was a good way to celebrate surviving the war and commemorating the dead by getting drunk off a near endless supply of booze, singing boisterous stories, and if time would allow it, going at it like bunnies.

Unfortunately, they didn't find this liquor cabinet. They did, however, find something that was only slightly less interesting. A large leather bound book. By large, I mean that it was roughly the size of three encyclopedias stacked on top of each other combined. On it, engraved in gold (All right, yellow marker pen with glitter covering it) were the words:

 **RULE BOOK OF SUDRIAN RAIL.**

The archaeologists spent many a drinkless, and sexless, night translating this. It wasn't that it was written in a foreign language or anything, it was just that the writer had very bad penmanship. They got as far as the first hundred or so rules before they needed a break. This involved going down to the local Co-Op and desperately haggling over the price of a few jam tarts. They were living the dream.

Here then, is the translation. Note the clear signs that the engines themselves contributed to this, and the many addendum's to each rule suggests how life was like back then. Also, some of these do not appear to actually be rules. Or make sense.

...

1: Please note, calling Sir Topham Hatt 'Fatty' to his face is not something encouraged. At all.

2: If you mention becoming mayor to Thomas, please do not make reference to the time he attempted to become said mayor. We'd all really like to forget it.

3: Addressing Edward as 'Old Fart' or 'Wheezy' or 'Eddie' is a big no no.

4: Don't make cracks about Henry's love for trees. The jokes about 'log' and 'wood' was funny the first time. Not so much after ten years of it.

5: Mentioning the time that Gordon ended up getting drunk at the Christmas Party and sobbing about how his life is terrible is a health risk. Don't do it.

6: Don't James that he'd look better in blue.

7: Asking about 'Mr Deer' and 'Mr Rabbit' to Percy will get you a black eye. Don't say these things.

8: Try not to bring up electric trams around Toby. He gets a little huffy.

9: Don't quack at Duck. It wasn't even funny the first time.

10: Removing scotch from Donald's grasp is impossible. Please do not try and do it to be contrary.

11: Make a reference to Douglas about brake-vans. Go on. Try it. We'll wait.

12: Oliver, you;re officially banned from mentioning anything regarding your escape from scrap.  
12a: You're mean!  
12b: Not mean. We're sane. We would like to remain that way.

13: For the love of god, don't make references to Caroline overheating in any sexual manner. We've got enough bloody lawsuits about discrimination in the workplace, thank you very much.

14: For that matter, making remarks about Emily's big wheels in any sexual way falls under the same boat.

15: Harold has a gambling problem. Do not encourage it.  
15a: This means you, Bill and Ben.  
15b: Wha-? No fair, Edward!  
15c: Fair. Very fair.

16: Cutting trees down in front of Henry, no matter how hysterical is, is not allowed any more.

17: On a similar note, don't mention BoCo in front of Edward. He's liable to start crying, and dealing with our emotions is not the Sudrian way!

18: Victor informs me that several engines have been using the Steamworks as a crack den. Please don't do that. Please.

19: If Edward and Gordon are in the same set of sheds, there must be at least two engines between them at all times.

20: Waxing day is a thing that only James is allowed to take part in. It is not an excuse, Henry and Gordon, to get out of work.  
20b: I'd say that's rabbish, wouldn't you, Henry?  
20c: A lot of bloody rabbish, indeed, Gordon?  
20d: WHEN I FIND YOU TWO, YOU ARE DEAD!

21: Mentioning THAT ISLAND is strictly prohibited.

22: Laughing at Henry whenever he has a mishap with the Flying Kipper IS condoned, and celebrated!  
22a: You guys are why I drink at night.  
22b: Piss off, Henry.

23: All Scottish accents must be reigned in. We can't understand a bloody word you're saying any more.

24: Calling Freddie 'Duke 2.0 Because We Needed A New Toy' is not allowed. No matter how true it may be.

25: Duncan, please for the love of god, stop insulting Rusty. You must have something, anything better to do!

26: Charlie's jokes are not funny. Stop enabling his habit.

27: As Oliver the Excavator is much less well known than Oliver the train, we shall change his name via deed poll to Diggy the Digger. All in favor? Motion passes.  
27a: Don't I get a say in this?  
27b: No, you Bob the Builder rejects.

28: Don't listen to more than five stories of Salty's in a row while sober.

29: Carlin, here a list of pubs you are not allowed to visit after nine. ALL OF THEM.

30: Quoting 'Once An Engine Attached To A Train' at Henry has gotten really, really old. Don't do it.

31: Commenting that Daisy looks like BoCo with a ton of makeup on is not helpful. Or politically correct, for the matter.

32: Hiding Percy's medication has not, nor will ever be, funny.  
32a: Looking at you, Charlie.

33: Don't try using the jet engine just to win a race against Bertie, Thomas. We've got enough property damage to deal with already.

34: No, Diesel, throwing Paxton off the edge of Brendam Docks is not a good way to improve his memory problems.

35: Victor is not your friend, he is your doctor. Stop trying to sell him drugs and let him fix you, damn it!

36: Marion's not allowed to come within a hundred feet of Rex,Mike or Bert.

37: The swear jar is not a suggestion, it's an order. Use it. Stop breaking it everytime any of you get in a huff!

38: Diesel is not allowed to make choices for film night any more.

39: Arry and Bert are not allowed to make scrap jokes any more. It's a bit in bad taste.  
39a: 'E's biased! I call this discrimination!  
39b: You're bloody lucky that Oliver's holding me back right now, Arry! Or else Duck would be amuck!

40: Roses are red, violets are blue, you read out one of Rosie's love poems to Thomas, and he will effing cut you.

41: Rheneas's blandness is no reason to try and sell him. Don't sell engines. Unless it's me, in which case, I can do whatever I want.

42: Sir Handel, please stop reading out chapters of the Fifty Shades Trilogy. It's off-putting. We don't care if it's for comedy purposes, it's upsetting.

43: Don't look into Terrance's eyes for too long. And if you do, get a priest in to check that you're intact.

44: Don't eat Dilly the Duck.

45: Calling Spencer a prick is banned because it's so bloody obvious. Come up with more creative insults.

46: Stanley, pick a voice and stick with it!

47: No one is to bake another pineapple upside-down cake in the set of the Sudrian Bake Off.

48: If engines were meant to go to space, then they would have been born with rockets strapped to them. Do not, Percy, think you can Tim Peake your way up into the atmosphere.

49: James and singing do not go together. He's banned from kareoke.  
49a: Could you say he's...rabbish at it?  
49b: I am going to stab you, Percy!

50: When I suggest that you don't let rumors be your only source of information, I BLOODY WELL MEAN IT!  
50a: Someone's cranky.  
50b: No, he's down at the docks.  
50c: Piss off, Charlie.

51: Calling the Small Railway Engines toy trains is not cool. Also, Mike will hurt you. Repeatedly.

52: The turntable is not a wrestling rink. Please, for the love of god, don't try and piledrive Cranky on the concrete.

53: Welsh Coal is officially banned.  
53a: As is inhaling china clay. It's. Just. Clay.

54: When the Euro-vision Song Contest is on, no one cares about what you have to say, so sit down and shut up, watch the show!

55: Don't mention Rule 55

56: Don't accuse Toby of having woodlice. He will electrocute you.

57: Sir Handel, stop making fun of Peter Sam for liking Bagpuss. His crying annoys the rest of us. Love, the Others.

58: Don't ask where Dennis is. Especially to Norman.

59: Hiro is not a toy. Thomas and Percy, please stop arguing who gets to spend time with him.

60: In future, pretending that you are dead and then leaping up and shouting "SURPRISE!" is banned as an anniversary gift for the older engines.

61: No, Emily, just because you decide you want independence from the Island of Sodor does not mean that you get off work for a week while we call a referendum.

62: Anyone, as a catchphrase, saying 'That's Right' in anything other than a satirical way shall be stoned.

63: If you are going to have a trippy as all f**k acid mushroom-samba sequence, preferably to song, then please do so somewhere where you won't accidentally total an entire town, eh, Derek?

64: The only country we are allowed to insult is America. Suck it, Hank.

65: Stop asking Caitlin and Conner to do the riverdance.

66: Girls night out is becoming a regular things, lads. Deal with it.  
66a: Rock on, my sister! Fight the patriarchy!  
66b: Rosie, it's one in the morning. Go to sleep.

67: Shouting OBJECTION every time you're in a courtroom is not something you should do.  
67a: It is funny though, right Toby?  
67b: It is that, Perce.

68: If there are any invading demons coming our way, please tell them that they must stave off their plans to destroy the world until Wednesday, as Tuesday is Bingo Night.

69: Engines cannot copulate. Please stop trying it out.  
69b: On another note, stop looking up fanart regarding that. We'd all like to be able to sleep again.

70: No, Donald, playing your bagpipes at three in the morning is not a creative solution to boredom, don't do it anymore.

71: Please stop suggesting that we blow up all of our problems. We're not bloody Americans.

72: When asked about being politically correct, do not groan and go "God, not again!"

73: Please say Rabbish at every opportunity. It's not getting old any time soon!  
73a: THAT'S NOT TRUE YOU LIAR!  
73b: You're biased, James. I think it's hysterical.  
73c: What makes you think I'm James!? I'm a concerned citizen!  
73d: I'm standing right behind you, James.  
73e: Bugger.

74: Poetry night at the docks is now cancelled, as Cranky has been deemed 'too depressing even by our standards'. Also, because he's currently in counseling. Again.

75: Daisy is no longer allowed to pull Annie or Clarabel. Or any coach for that matter.

76: Don't ask when Ryan's voice is due to break. Or ask why he sounds less like a celebrity.

77: Please do not throw a jamboree every time Whiff and/or Scruff take a bath. It gets very taxing.

78: When talking to Molly, you are not allowed to ask "Molly who?" as she tends to get a little emotional when people tend to forget about her.  
78b: Try asking her to be less forgettab- (This part is smudged by something that appears to be blood)  
78c: You want to make a crack like that again, Charlie?  
78d: You're a shit, Eddie!  
78e: I refer you to rule three, which you are in violation of.  
78f: Screw you!  
78g: Heh. Thanks, Edward.  
78h: No prob, Molly.

79: If you come across Tom Tipper and his van having a...night out, please look the other way and keep driving.

80: Making steam engine noises when you are not a steam engine is not endearing, it's strange. Hint hint, Stafford.

81: Calling the Pack 'Bob the Builder' knock-offs is apparently offensive. To who, I'm not sure.

82: Do not quote Allo Allo at Millie.

83: Stop giving Sidney actual jobs of importance. He will screw them up somehow.  
83a: You're just annoyed that Sidney pulled the express better than you.  
83b: Shut up, Oliver.

84: Mavis is now officially banned from singing 'Oh I Do Like To Be Besides the Seaside' for the next month or so.  
84a: Patriarchy!  
84B: Rosie wrote this one, Mavis.

85: If you see a sign saying 'DON'T PASS THIS BOARD', it is generally a good idea to acknowledge it.

86: Don't call Harvey Igor.  
86b: And yes, calling him Eye-Gor counts as well.

87: Flynn is not to go around randomly spraying blue engines at random.

88: Please stop asking why some accents keep changing at a whim. No one really cares.

89: Politics are a no-no.  
85b: #ScrewTrump!  
85c: #HailBernie!  
85d: #AmIGoingToHaveToComeOverThereAndSortThisOutStopGettingBloodyPoliticalYouTwo!

90: Don't get Henry, Edward or Gordon off on the state of children's television these days. You will be there for quite a while.

91: Marathons of B-Movies are no longer allowed. Otherwise, James will get nightmares all night, and that would be rabbish for all involved.  
91a: Right, you stay still, Toby!

92: Don't mention the Incident of Skiff and the Mermaid to The Fat Controller. Unless you like being on shunting duty for a fortnight.

93: No matter how hard you try, Thomas, you are never going to be able to fly. Stop pretending to be Peter Pan.

94: Singing Ernie, The Fastest Milkman in the West has been banned. We actually want that song to get out of our heads.

95: Do not spoil the ending of the Mousetrap. Or else I'll sick Murdoch on you.

96: Asking why Diesel 10 is back on the railway after nearly trying to kill us is not appreciated.

97: Arthur, no one cares about your spotless record, and if you say anything more about it, I shall kill you.  
97b: That's not a rule, Thomas.  
97c: You underestimate me, Arthur.

98: If any of you is thinking of doing anything food-related with regards to pranks this year for Hatt, please stop thinking that right now.

99: LISTEN YOU! THE NEXT PERSON TO SAY RABBISH GETS ONE RIGHT IN THE EYE.  
99b: ...Rabbish.  
99c: BE THANKFUL, MURDOCH, THAT I AM MERCIFUL! Stopping making chicken noises, you lot!

100: Don't ever, ever, EVER try and address your problems in a mature way. Ever. Signed, The Producers.


	11. In Which Baking Happens

"Hello, and welcome to this pilot episode that hopefully will lead us somewhere! Or back into the bowels of cancellation, again! We're used to being there by now, but hey, we might as well give it a whirl, eh?" Spencer chuckled in a way that was probably meant to sound self-deprecating, but came off instead as bitter. "This is Spencer, the Private Engine of the Duke and Duchess of Boxford-"

"And his trusty sidekick, Mavis!" The diesel glared at the silver engine, who sulkily stepped back, allowing the spotlight to shine on the diesel. "And welcome to this, the first episode of the Great Sudrian Bake-Off!"

Edward watched the events nervously. He hadn't liked this idea. He had been very clear about this. "I don't like this idea!" he declared to all and sundry. "This is going to bomb terribly, in the best case scenario!"

"Best case?" Henry raised an eyebrow up. "What's the worst case?"

"We accidentally blow up the entire Island."

"We do that every other day, though!" James said, pointedly glaring at Edward. The blue engine sighed, and retreated from the stage to go and return to his nice and nuclear-protected bunker, in the hope that when the worst came to the worst, he would be able to survive the blast and restart anew. This time he'd not make the same mistake of letting engines be idiots.

He, Neville and Molly (The only two he had been able to convince to come into the shelter with him, somehow) settled back and tried not to cringe too much at what was to come.

Spencer's grin was now fixed to his face so tightly that it would have not unreasonable to assume it had been painted on. "Now, with us today are four. contenders-" He had to force his tongue around the word, each syllable sounding like he was on the verge of throwing up while saying it "-who are here to prove that they can bake like there is no tomorrow!"

"Indeed, and while the two of us will be up here...all alone...having to endure awkward silences while we wait to judge...with nothing to look forward too...Er, on the ground, Rosie and Millie will be watching our doe-eyed contestants make things that will no doubt leave us speechless!"

"You've got that right." muttered Stephen. Ulfstead was an odd place to put a bunker, but Edward had decided that seeing as Stephen and Glynn wanted to see Millie make her big debut on TV, it couldn't hurt. Also there for moral support were Toby and Henrietta. Neville had made a joke about being the youngest one here by a landslide. He had nearly been glared out of the bunker entirely, and it was only thanks to the mercy of Stephen that he hadn't been abandoned.

As the camera cut to Rosie, giving her speech with all the usual pep, Molly leaned over to talk to Glynn. "So, um, do you know who's on here?"

"Not a clue, love! I hear it was a complete last minute thing!" Glynn grimaced. "Mind, watching television like this, makes me wonder if I shouldn't have just stayed on that blasted siding!"

"Our first baker-" Millie declared, solemnly "-is James the Red Engine, who is twenty-six-"

"HA!" shouted Toby and Edward as one.

"-and apparently has the best buns you will ever see on TV!"

Edward had been drinking at this, and nearly spat it out through his nose. As he recovered, Neville decided to do what any bored person with too much time on their hands did and write a letter to Ofcom.

"Am I a bragger?" James laughed snootily. "Uh, no! Of course not! I am humble to the extreme! I am thoughtful towards my many, many, friends, kind, clever, generous, loyal, funny-"

"And Magic makes it all complete!" belted out Neville, who was a secret brony. By secret, we mean that it was about as wildly known as what 007's real name was.

"I have had little experience in the kitchen before. At least, a kitchen like this. But back at home, my friends, who are many, tell me that I am an expert at trying. All the time, they tell me, I try so hard that they start crying! I've made chocolate cakes that have left them speechless! Can I win? You bet I can!"

Toby had been quietly snickering throughout this entire vignette. He began to laugh even louder when it was revealed who contender number two was.

"Would I say that I am a good cook?" Sir Handel laughed somewhat less than confidently. "I...I sure am! Ha! I...i definitely didn't sign up for this as a joke at all, a dare gone horribly wrong, and now I'm on Island-wide TV on the verge of making a tit of myself over a lemon meringue! ...On the plus side, Freddie owes me twenty pounds. And a lot of favors!"

"Well this should be entertaining, at least." Edward remarked. Henrietta was still angry that they hadn't asked her to step in for on of the legitimate bakers, and thus said nothing more, aside from a brief harumph to Toby. The latter clucked sympathetically.

...

"And what previous baking experience have you had, sir?"

"I blew up a fishing trawler!"

"Good to know, have fun with that, Donald!" Rosie waited until the cameras had gone to focus on their fourth guest, who appeared to be crying that the height of his kitchen top was unfair, before turning back to Millie and grimacing. "Why do we always get the nuts?"

"I 'ave no idea! Eet is like they just come crawling out of ze woodwork!"

"Are they about to start?"

"ATTENTION CONTENDERS!"

"Oh what the f**k even is this?" shouted Mike, competitor number four, as Spencer wheeled himself out wearing a magnificent cape that was longer than he was, and just as gaudy. Mavis poked out from under it like a kitten caught under a quilt. She looked...well, about as well as anyone trapped under a cape that looked as though it could suffocate you if you tripped could.

"WELCOME TO THIS, THE FIRST BAKING CONTEST! Please let my rousing speech fill you with hope!"

"Booo! Bring back the carnie!" Sir Handel snapped.

"You don't look roused-"

"SPENCER! Ahem. Right. First task. Make a three tiered chocolate cake." Mavis grinned. Said grin appeared to have died a long time ago. "So, something nice and meaty for you to get stuck into. You have ONE hour!"

At home, one could distinctly hear Edward cackle with sheer glee.

...

The processes that each competitor went through to make this chocolate cake (A tough,but not unreasonable first challenge) were unique to say the least. Recorded here are the basics.

James started off strongly by accidentally crushing a bowl beneath his wheels. Undeterred by this early setback, he improvised by shoving all of his ingredients (With the help of his mechanical arm supplied by the tech boys on the Island) into a cement mixer. "No prob!" he beamed, as the cement mixer made a funny noise and begun to splutter. He ignored this, however, and immediately went looking for the red food coloring. After a moment's hesitation, he found a shaker full of something and poured it into the barrel. It was red, so he thought that it counted. Next, he decided to stir the mixture. There was no spoon to hand (More on that later) so he was forced to use a large pitchfork helpfully left out for the inevitable angry mob that was to come. At which point, he poured the mixture (With the help of a crane) into a baking tray, and using his teeth, maneuvered it into the oven.

Sir Handel had managed to keep his bowl relatively intact, bar a few cracks and chips that had been the result of a 'Who Can Spin The Bowl the Fastest' competition earlier with Bill and Ben. He was following an old Mid-Sudrian recipe made during the war, which was the last time he'd had chocolate cake. After pouring in the necessary parts of chocolate, he then shot the ceiling at the right angle to let some of the sawdust fall down and sweeten the deal. His words, mind. Sure, it brought down some of the plaster and cement, but there was nothing wrong with that. He then prepared a small cherry for decorating purposes. He then turned his attention to the mixing, and began to stir with the wooden spoon provided. Seconds later, he stole James's one, as his own had shattered into two. One vigorous battle later, he decided that the batter had been taught a lesson, and so the bowl was shoved in without any fuss.

Donald, meanwhile, had gone for a unique approach. He had on his person some ten to twelve packets of buttons and bars that his driver, a noted sweetaholic, used to eat while on duty. So it was the work of the moment to add, with the provided ingredients, the contents of this secret stash to give it a little sweeter taste. Donald then decided to do something even more devious and underhanded. He poured in a fair amount of champagne that he just happened to have on him (Because those Caledonians are wacky drinkers, am I right? I am.) and then used his arm to spin the bowl around like a roundabout in lieu of actually stirring. He was the first to get his 'cake' in the oven.

Mike was trying desperately not to fall off the very small stool that had been provided for him. Therefore, his cooking plan was erratic at best. Ironically, his had the most thought going into it. He knew what to put in a cake through repeated views through the Small Controller's window (Mrs Fergus Duncan was a well known naturalist, and as odd as it sounded, the small engines could get very curious). The problem was that the stool was very slippy-slidey, which resulted in a rather bizarre combination of five eggs, a whole chocolate bar the size of Mike's buffers, a whole bag of flour and just the tiniest bit of cooking oil in the bowl. Mixing it was actually no problem, even if there was a slight problem with the whisk. After a moment, he managed to shove the mixture into a tray and knocked it into the oven with all the bad temper of an angry footballer.

"Now, how do they think it's going?" Rosie asked Millie. Millie didn't answer, too busy was she giggling at the alcohol on Donald's table. Rosie gave up after a moment and decided to sample some too.

"Great!" James told the camera, as the cement mixer caught fire.

"Wonderful!" beamed Sir Handel, as a funny smell of cement began to fill the air.

"Couldn't be better!" muttered Donald, as his alcohol supply dwindled rapidly.

"SHIT! F**K! IS IT ON FIRE!?" declared Mike, as...guess what happened.

...

Once the fire had been put out, and the cakes were styled, the two judges wearily approached them.

First up was Sir Handel's. "There was a minor technical issue." He admitted, as the cake collapsed into a pile of dust. Spencer, never one to think things through, tried a piece of the dust. His expression said it all, really.

Then came Mike's. The only thing that could be said about Mike's (Aside from the fact that it was impressive that one could burn chocolate in such a fashion) was that he had made up for it with style points. The tiers were certainly far better than the taste, which could be charitably described as 'unique'.

Donald beamed proudly, as the four hosts began to giggle slightly at the alcohol. His cake, unsurprisingly, got rave reviews, despite the fact that it looked about as tiered as...well, a pile of dust.

And then came James. In the bunker, Edward and Toby leaned forward with bated breath.

"This is a red velvet cake!" James said with pride. "I have made it with my own sweat, tears and other bodily fluids. Not literally of course."

"What are those holding up the layers?"

"Those are pencils. Mike nicked my tiers, so...had to improvise. Now, it's time for the taste!" A slice was carved for all three of them, James, Spencer and Mavis, and they all took a bite as one.

it is worth noting that what James had dropped into the mixing bowl was not, in fact, red food coloring. It was in fact grounded up peppers, or more specifically, a Carolina Reaper. It is an understatement to say that this pepper was quite hot.

You can guess what happened next.

As the three of them screamed, James accidentally kicked more of the pepper up into his eyes. "IT BURNS!" He screamed. Well, it was a little more unintelligible than that, but you get the gist.

To this day, no one has ever heard Edward the Blue Engine laugh as loudly as he did in that moment.

...

Once James had been pulled out of his loop of constantly inhaling and/or getting pepper dust on his face, the show continued. The next task was to create a black pudding. All condiments had been moved to a safe distance, so hopefully nothing could go wrong.

They were wrong.

As the four of them got to work on making the pudding, there was a sudden increase in the amount of wind near the tent. Despite their best efforts, eventually the others could not let this go unnoticed. Rosie and Millie glanced outside to see Tiger Moth zooming in at lightning speed.

"YOU CANNOT HAVE A CONTEST WITHOUT ME! I'M TIGER BLOODY-"

At which point the camera cut out.

...

"You know, shows like this is why I don't pay my license fee."

"Oh, don't start that again, Henrietta!"

"Erm...should we be concerned for them? At all?" Molly was surprised to find that once again, she was the only one who actually seemed to give a damn about what happened to the people they loosely referred to as their friends.

"Nah, they'll be fine. Nothing can sink those lot!"

And sure enough, the camera returned mid-way through the final task. They were later to learn that Sir Handel's black pudding had exploded, due to him accidentally putting in napalm. No one was quite sure how he had managed to do this. It was a mystery that the rest of the world would have to wonder about for a long time to come.

This task, Rosie helpfully explained to the viewer at home, was simple. Make your special dish. Each one of the contestants had announced, after prompting from the now slightly maddened camera crew, their dish to the audience. Sir Handel was making a flan, Donald a selection of Cornish Pastries, Mike a pineapple upside down cake and James had quit, and was now sulking in the corner. He had taken the brunt of the black pudding explosion.

"And now, we go to the contestants!"

"Here we are!" Sir Handel presented his flan. It tasted like stone. One could see Spencer's teeth crack the second he tried to take a bite of the unfortunate item. Mavis was wiser, and simply spat it out the second she realized it weighed more than the average chair. "NEXT!" she snapped.

Donald's cornish pastry was wheeled forward. Before either of them could even begin to taste it, it promptly poofed out of existence. He still got a higher mark than Sir Handel, though, who was sulking in the corner.

And then it came to the upside-down cake. Spencer loved to eat pineapple upside-down cake, so he moved forward.

At which point, the pineapple upside-down cake _ate_ him.

...

It took five hundred missiles, almost half the entire RAF and a brave attack by Duck to destroy the Pineapple-Upside-Down Creature for good, at which point Spencer was taken to a nearby hospital for therapy.

Donald won, and proudly placed his trophy in the shed where he bragged about it to anyone who was listening.

Unsurprisingly, the show was not picked up for a full run.


	12. In Which Roleplaying Is Attempted

PLEASE NOTE: My knowledge of actual roleplaying is very incomplete. This is just me taking what little knowledge I have and creating a completely fictious game. This is meant to be fun.

Also, second time I've tried something like this. Hope you enjoy!

* * *

The air was thick with the smell of ashes and roasting cadavers.

In the midst of a large pile of corpses, stacked high atop each other as if in a throne, a tall human dressed in rather dented looking armor was cleaning his sword. His companion, a slightly lanky elf, strode forward, his face caked with blood, save for the large scarf that he had wrapped around his mouth.

"Halt, sterward fighter!" declared the human, who was a cheerful bastard even in dire situations such as this. "We appear to be have forced back the rogues who had so greviously planned to hurt and destroy all in their path! Mayhaps we return to the Drunken Dragon for the partaking of the mead and the company of the women folk!"

There was a pause, and then the elf looked at the human oddly. "Are you really going to talk like this throughout the entire game?"

"What do you mean, friend elf!?"

"Nothing, I suppose...um...Gordo-"

"My full title, please!"

"...Mmmm. Sir Gordo of the Western Woods, Hero to All and Wooer of Women, remind me again...who hired us exactly?"

"Why, friend Eddvard, twas the noble Parlicians! Those poor people who hath been driven from their rightful land! But now, thanks to us, they can get through yonder narrow crevice to lay siege to the dreaded Spiky Creatures of Spikey Spikes, without the fear that over the other way, the Spikey Cavalry will not be arriving to trap them, via the use of yet another crevice!"

"...Are we sure that we've got the right crevice?"

"What?"

"Well I mean...it's a crevice. We're not talking the difference between a mouse and a cat here, are you sure you've got the right crevice!?"

"Yes, good sir, I am!"

After a silence, Eddvard started up again. "These, er, Parlicians...what'd they look like? I mean, you're the one who met them and got this quest."

"Oh, about...yay high, purple skin, pig-like snouts, ears like a rabbit."

Eddvard picked up one of the heads of the corpses that littered the ground. He turned it towards Gordo. The purple skinned, pig snouted, rabbit eared head. "Like this you mean?"

"Yes, like-" Gordo looked at the head for a moment, and then loudly proclaimed:

"OH FUCK."

...

"Why didn't you tell me that we were fighting the wrong side?!" wailed Gordon, as Edward and James began simultaneously slamming their faces upon the nearest hard surface they could find.

The GM, Rosie, sighed. "Because you didn't give me a chance to? What with Thomas dying in such a...bizarre fashion?"

"I still say I should have won!" declared the outraged tank engine, sulking in the corner. "What was it about what I did that was so wrong?!"

Edward gave Thomas an odd look. "Yes, I'm sure running into the middle of a bunch of heavily armored soldiers screaming "YIPEE-KI-YAY, MOTHERFUCKER!" and waving your crossbow around like a light-saber did not in anyway contribute to your early death."

"Bah! You just have no idea how to play this game!"

"And you do?" asked Percy, innocently. "This is our first go! All of us!"

"Okay, Rosie, what do we do now?"

Rosie examined her long, long list of plot...and then threw it out of reach. "I had this whole big game planned with character development and stuff like that. You've kind of ruined all that, so...it's up to you."

"Okay." Edward paused. "Where is the nearest tavern? That's the place where we go to get a new character for Thomas, right?"

"Yeah, you are correct. It's currently in the village that you passed through before the battle started. Now, you can go back there, but it's a three hour ride, and people might get suspicious because of all the blood and dead body smell that is over you at the moment."

...

"I regret most of my decisions." remarked Honry, the Dwarf, as Eddvard handed him a mug of tea, with added rainwater in it to flavor it. "I mean, the part where I buried my ax in someone's skull and then used the rest of his body as a club was pretty metal-"

"No doubt there!" agreed Emily, the Forsaken Paladin.

"-but then I hurt that innocent butterfly! IT'S LIFE HAS BEEN FORSAKEN!"

"Oh, shut up, you small bastard." muttered Ja-Mez. The golem glared around at the team and spat at the ground. "Now what happens?!"

"The only thing I can think of to do-" said Eddvard after a moment of silence "-is to take a long way around to try and get rid of these Spiky sons of bitches."

"Why?"

"At least that way, we get some loot out of it. Maybe enough to get us out of the general vicintiy of any reprisal's?"

"We can always blame Gordo for what happened at any rate." agreed Emily. Gordo spluttered, but he was promptly ignored. "So, we head to the other crevice and kill em all, right?"

"Right. Perce, bury this lot. Last thing we want to do is make ourselves look even worse than we already do. And don't loot them!"

"Awww, but Eddvward-"

"NO!"

...

"Not acting very elfish, there, are you?" Toby muttered out of the side of his mouth.

"Oh, hush."

...

And so the seven of them set out on their great quest, after waiting quite a long time for Tobias, their mage, and Perce, their bard, to finish burying the bodies.

They walked for what felt like hours, but in reality was only ten minutes, in the general direction of the attack point for the Spikey Bastards, as they had taken to calling their foe. At which point. Perce realized that their spirits were low.

"I shall sing to thee a song that shall cheer us all up!"

"Oh, you really don't need to do that." said Eddvard, wearily.

"Nah, it is only natural that I do that which I have trained for all my life!"

"No...no, seriously, please do not." Toby said, through gritted teeth.

"OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!  
Who lives in eternal torment under the sea?  
SPONGEBOB SQUAREPANTS!  
Really quite annoying and stupid is he!  
SPONGEBOB-"

"Knock it off, John Barrowman, I've got a migraine like no one else's business!"

Perce remained silent for a bit. And then:

"One day more! Another day another destiny!  
This never ending road to Calgary!  
These men who seem to know my crime  
Shall surely come a second time!"

"Giggity." muttered Ja-Mez, ruining the mood a little.

There was a long silence as they reached a hill. They were halfway up when Perce broke out with a fierce lute solo.

"Say your prayers little one  
Don't forget, my son  
To include everyone  
Tuck you in, warm within  
Keep you free from sin  
'Till the sandman he comes  
Sleep with one eye open  
Gripping your pillow tight!"

At which point, Honry punched him out, and began dragging him up the hill by the scruff of his neck.

...

"You guys are no fun." Percy said, sulking.

"No. We're not!" agreed Edward and Gordon as one.

...

At last, they reached a ridge not too far from the Crevice. The seven of them sat and ate their rations, all the while keeping an eye out for the army.

"So, how do you want to do this?" remarked Emily after what felt like a while.

"Umm..."

...

Edward looked around. "Okay, so can we get a bit of an explanation of what the lay of the land is?"

"Sure. The crevice itself is incredibly narrow. A normal sized human could probably only make their way through it two at a time."

"Right, so if an army like the Spiky Bastards want to get through, they can't rush." Edward nodded.

Toby had an idea. "Uh, I roll for...Perception, is it? And I check to see if there is any way forward that doesn't involve going through the crevice itself."

Rosie raised an eyebrow. She hadn't expected anyone to start thinking logically about this, after all. "Okay!" Her driver clicked the Online Dice that they'd had to use for this session and she peered down. "Okay, you rolled a...fifteen, so you notice that no, there is no way for the army to come towards you, save for the already mentioned crevice."

James glanced down at a large booklet. "Okay, so according to the information booklet, the Spiky Creatures of Spikey Spikes are large creatures, known for their warlike ability...but rather stupid. They have a feudal loyalty to their King. Namely, the King dies, then they lose heart."

"Hmm...okay, what do we see coming out of the crevice? Are they there?"

Rosie examined her notes. "You cannot see anything at present. However, you can hear the sound of large footsteps making their way towards you. According to what you've learned from the...lamentably dead enemies of the Spikey bastards, this is likely to be a scout party, sent in advance by the King to scout out the area, see if there are any traps waiting for them."

"Okay!" Henry grinned at the others. "Got an idea. They've got their armor on, haven't they? They have? Great! Right, now, the second the scouts get outside. Tobias, can you cast that spell you've got...um, Muffler? That way, when we attack, we'll not be heard by the remainder of the army?"

"I can." Toby nodded. "And then while you guys take them on from the front, I'll sneak up and maybe take them out with a magic spell."

"Right, and then we Wizard of Oz our way back to camp and make sure that we get the King to send home the calvary before we kill him and end this nightmare!" Emily nodded sagely. "This is a good plan."

"Okay, how about we just take stock of all our weapons for a moment?"

...

"You know, I always forget to bring enough axeheads on a quest like this!" Honry complained to a sympathetic Eddvard. "I mean, what if I were to meet someone, and their skull didn't have an axe in it!? I can't help it that I'm so generous!"

"You're a true hero, Honry." said Eddvard. "Now, see, with me it's the opposite problem. I keep finding my arrows and having too many of them! I keep telling my blacksmith to stop! I'm fine without more1 But no...he keeps on having to give me more of them!"

"It's so...shit, here they are. Okay, Tobias?"

"Standing by! I cast Muf-"

"GORRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRDO JENKINS!" Gordo rushed from the ridge towards the somewhat stunned Spikey Bastards, sword outstretched and spittle flying from his mouth.

The remaining six members of the guild looked at each other in bafflement, horror and just the tiniest bit of "Well, why didn't we see this happening?" before hastily improvising another plan.

...

"I use Freeze on them!"

The dice was rolled. "Twelve. It temporarily freezes them, but you only have three minutes to do whatever it is you're going to do."

"All right!" Edward looked to Toby and Percy. "You two! Get the things out of the armor and murder em good and proper! And...what's the status on Gordo?"

"Oh, he died two seconds after charging at them!"

"Right...have the rest of the army been alerted?"

Rosie thought for a moment. "They're certainly aware that something is going on, but they aren't going to rush off just yet."

"Then the plan can still work! Percy, James, get in the two suits of armor we have, and take Gordon's dead body back to the king as proof that you have dealt with any intruders!" Edward was beginning to lose it. "Right, second you convince him to turn the cavalry back, come back out, and before they even get one soldier out, Toby'll drop a shit-ton of rocks on them!" Edward paused. "That's...that's a thing you can do, right?"

"I...don't know? Is it, Rosie?"

"Sort of?"

"GOOD ENOUGH!"

Gordon was sulking. "It was a perfect plan!"

"Yes, and then you ruined it! I hope you're happy!"

...

"All right, now...evening chaps, nothing wrong here! Aha! Ha! Haaaaaaaaaaaaa-Ja-Mez, are you doing okay?"

"Yeah, okay, we've got about...oh dear. A hundred at least. And they're all quite tall."

There was a pause, and then suddenly, at once, the assembled Spikey Bastards started up a fierce chant, as the two intruders crouched just behind a rock.

"Okay, so...I'll go and speak to the King, you tell the others that they're distracted."

"Okay!" Perce turned and whispered behind him. But no one could hear him, naturally. So he of course did the only logical solution that he could think of.

He stood up and bellowed "OI! YOU LOT! NOW'S OUR CHANCE!"

...

Out of character, seven roleplaying engines and a GM let out long, frustrated groans, while the eighth roleplaying engine looked slightly baffled as to what was wrong with his plan.

...

Ja-Mez, who was currently three steps away from entering the King's tent, froze. He had just enough time to mutter "Oh sh-" before the tent flap flew open, and a Spikey Bastard about the size of the highest point of the crevice exited it and strode towards Perci.

"Uh...I roll for defense?" said the green caterpillar with red stripes out of character.

One roll later, and Perci's skull was flatter than an extra's acting in a B-Movie from the 50's.

Ja-Mez reacted by casually sliding backwards until he was safely around the corner, then running madly. "WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE! WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!"

Eddvard was grimly determined. "Lads! And lass! Let's do this! Honry, get ready to start using those axeheads! Emily, hit em until they die! Ja-Mez...don't die! Tobias...blast em!"

And so the last battle began!

And almost ended, as Honry tripped running towards the soldiers, and accidentally stuck his ax inside Emily's head. "OOPS!" said he.

...

"You know, I'm aware that a poor workman is one who blames his tools, but this is seriously weak, guys."

"Oh shut up, James." Toby paused, rolled the dice and grinned. "Now, I cast GUSHTUS!"

"The entire crevice is now filled with water!"

"...Oh, wait, what's the one that makes all the tornadoes pop up?"

"That's Galetus."

"Oh...easy mistake to make, right guys?"

"And now Honry has drowned."

...

"CURSE YOU WATER! If only Honry had been two inches taller, he would not have drowned as such! DAMN YOU ALL TO HELL!"

"Ja-Mez, do you mind not freaking out right now? The King's coming towards us and I'd really appreciate it if we can at least give the appearance of an attempt at fighting."

Tobias beamed. "AH! This is perfect! I have a spell that should one-shot the King instantly!"

Ja-Mez and Eddvard looked at each other. At this point, they really didn't have much left to lose. Besides which, Ja-Mez was beginning to sort of get a little bit crumbly in the water. "Go ahead!"

Tobias cleared his throat, raised his hands unto the air and shouted "ZAPRADOS!"

"Wait, isn't that an electric spell?" Ja-Mez asked.

"WAIT, WE'RE STILL IN THE-"

The smell of freshly fried elf, mage, golem and Spikey bastard filled the air.

...

"Total Party Kill!" Rosie said, cheerfully. "On the plus side, you've managed to kill all the Spikey bastards in the area, including the king! Bad news, because you did so before convincing him to send the cavalry back, they're still coming and are going to pillage and plunder the land like nobody's business!"

"IN WHAT WORLD AM I ONE OF THE COMPETENT ONES HERE?!" shouted James in a rare moment of self-deprecation.

"He makes a wonderful point." muttered Emily, who was still sulking. Thomas had bogged off a few minutes ago, complaining about how the game was busted and broken.

"Ooops." Toby admitted sheepishly.

"See you all next week!"

Rosie grinned. And here she thought that Edward's book was going to leave her without material for her own.


	13. In Which Thomas Meets Pacific Rim

For those just joining, allow me a quick moment to deviate from the norm to tell you about a thing called 'The Multiverse Theory' and why it is important.

Okay, so, we live in a universe. That much is known. But there are some who argue that ours is not the only universe out there. That it's not even that rare a thing. That every time we so much as breath or sneeze or speak, another universe is created.

Let me give you an example. Got a coin? No? Okay, let me give you...give this back to me, after, all right? I've got a bus to catch and I'm very busy. All right, now, you have there in your hand a pound coin as was common in the UK around about Summer 2017. All right? Now. Flip it. If you want, you can attach a decision to it, or...don't. Simple.

Right. Done that? Good.

Now, what side it landed on doesn't matter. What does matter is that there is a universe in which the coin landed on 'heads'. And there is another universe wherein the opposite happened. And there is yet another universe, where the coin flew from your hand and slipped underneath the radiator never to seen again.

You get what I mean? Every choice we make, another universe forms. And every choice that follows from thereon, also creates a universe. And so on, and so forth, and hopefully by this point you will have gotten a general idea.

Now, the world of talking trains that we have spent so time in is no exception to that rule. Of course, the exact nature of what caused events to diverge from the norm is not yet known. But what is known is that there are more than a few worlds wherein the direction of events took quite a different turn. Some universes are very similar to the one that you have come to know. Others are far more optimistic, or far more cynical. And in some very particular cases, the characters we love aren't even engines at all.

And this is one of them.

...Now, give me my coin back. GIMME!

...

Our world...in chaos!

For thousands of years, our species had only one enemy! ITSELF! Two if you count resident parking. And maybe three if you account for the existence of Katie Hopkins.

But now, our world must put aside it's petty squabbles to deal with ancient creatures arising from the sea, determined to take over the entire world at any cost! As humanity bands together in the time of crisis, special groups have been set up to defeat these evil monsters.

But not just any group.

The elitest of the elite. The toppest of the top! These, my friends, are the Really Useful Squad! Captained by the Terrifying Tank, their ranks include:

The Ravishing Red!  
The Blue Battalion  
The Green Growler!  
The Big Brusier!  
The Small Sod!  
The Sassy Stirling!

And more!

So, are you ready for some ACTION!? Then come and watch the Really Useful Squad, only on in the mornings!"

...

The lights dimmed, and the smiling face of No.5, James, could be seen by all who looked at him. "Well?" He said, in a voice that was so unlike the bombastic voice of the narrator that it was hard to imagine that they were the same person. "Admit it, you're intrigued."

"We are definitely something." agreed Edward (No.2)

"Um..." said Henry, (No.3) looking a bit puzzled. "Some notes, if I may."

"Of course! Feedback is essential in this line of work!"

"Toppest is not a word."

At which point, James became sulky. "Well FINE! Don't sugercoat your harsh words of critiscm just for my sake, you understand!"

"Really, Percy? All the things we just saw, and that is the first thing that you fasten on."

"Oh no, I'm just warming us up. We need to pace ourselves as we tear this thing apart like it's nobody's business." Percy (No.6) turned to James. "No, my real first question is the animation."

"You have to allow for the fact that this is a work in progress! What I am showing you is in fact a work in progress!"

"James, even accepting that, which we do, I'm not sure the fact that you can clearly see someone's hand reach into frame and jerk the rather cheap looking stop motion puppets into place rather ruins the intended effect."

"Would you mock Smallfilms, Edward?"

"No James. I would not. Do you know why? Smallfilms was two people in a shed for most of the time, and yet somehow they managed to create the illusion of movement. You've had at least five percent of our paycheck for the last three months worth of work, and a team of supposed 'artists' working their arses off."

"Okay, okay, the animation clearly needs work. But let's move on to the second problem." Toby (No.7) pointed to the screen, currently showing the seven monster fighters in a pose. "The hell am I in all of this?!"

"Oh, you're in it! And you're quite the...re-occurring character."

"I am a central part of this unit. I provide moral support, and I'm relatively sane, unlike Pyromantic over there!"

Gordon (No.4) was insulted. "Oi! ...The term is pyromaniac, ta very much!"

"Umm...look, this is the way it is. Someone has to be...cut, usually. It's nothing personal, it's just that we did a survey and-"

"And WHAT?!" snappd Toby.

"Well...you're kind of the person that people would mind the least being removed. Or demoted."

"...Well. I'm going to remember that next time a bloody truck is bearing down on you. Cause from where I'm standing-"

"Come on, calm down you lot." Edward paused. "Though I must admit, I'm also not entirely sure why we can cut Toby, and yet somehow promote Thomas to leader status!"

"Well, it's just part of me charm, isn't it?" The Liverpudlian (No.1) was stretching out, feet on the table, and flicking ink at Henry (No.3) who was busy testing out the new coloring book they were releasing. "Don't feel bad, old man. The public just find me a bit more...eh, photogenesis than you!"

"Photogenic. Also, Thomas, you're still the shortest of us by far. Even considering that our code word for Percy over there is literally 'small'...and another thing, why those codenames?"

"Because of marketing! I mean, would you buy toys named 'Small' and 'Big' when you've got such dynamic nicknames as-"

"The Small Sod?!" asked a rather baffled and angry Percy.

"I'm pretty sure that one person does not a battalion make." murmured Edward.

"The Sassy Stirling!?"

"It's a metaphor, Emily!"

"...For what?" Emily (No.?) scratched her head. "I mean, really, it's a bit weird, isn't it? You all get something relating to how you get to fight, and all I get is Sassy!"

At which point, James was saved from having to answer that question by a loud beeping noise. Edward glanced down at his tablet and growled. "Okay, so...meeting over! We've got an incident in the Knapford Area."

"What are we dealing with?" asked Gordon, already springing for the door.

"Not sure as of yet! We're looking at two, possibly more creatures! No one's seen anything aside from shadows in the water! Which means that just in case, we're all going in. All guns blazing means that we don't have to worry about leaving the silver bullets at home."

"...That's a bit of a tortured metaphor, ain't it?"

"Get in the f**king giant robot, Thomas."

...

The eight of them were soon on their way. The 'f**king giant robot' as Edward had called it, was something that had been worked on for a long time...since, in fact, someone had caught reruns of Pacific Rim on telly and thought "Oooh! That might be cool to do!". And so, large mechanical monstrousities (That could also transform, because that same someone had seen the Transformers. The original cartoons and/or comics. Not the movies. They weren't that good, to be honest) were now humanity's first hope of success.

And, quite possibly, it's last.

"All right...we're in."

"Where are we, Blue?"

"The Knapford Rig's basically got the next fifteen miles to themselves. They can look for whatever they want here...unless, of course, they find something that they wish they hadn't." Edward sighed. "Okay. Tram, start scanning. Anything that matches records, give me a hoot."

"Got it."

"...So, you catch the game last night?"

"No. Don't like football." Henry sounded bored. Edward didn't blame him. Whenever things got like this, in the moments where Toby scanned the area, this was Thomas's go to line to breaking the ice.

"Well I did! I passed out halfway through the game, but I started watching it." Emily sounded just as thrilled as ever. That is to say, not at all.

"You're all terrible!"

"God, you know what your problem is?! All of you? You're just so dense, you can't see the woods for the treeeeeeeeeeeeeees-"

The seven robots boggled, as much as a robot can boggle, as Henry vanished instantly from sight beneath the waters.

"Well that's new..." remarked Percy.

"Tram?"

"Tracking...tracking...how tough is this stuff?"

"The boffins dropped it down to 730 metres. Then a little further...got down to about nine hundred before there was any real problem." But no one could miss the clear worry in Edward's voice. "Where is he now?"

"He's stopped. he's...he's about seven hundred and fifty, give or take a margin of error."

"A margin of error is not something I need right now. We need an update on where Green is. Hold on...Big, you getting anything on comms?"

"Hold up...Green? ...Green, come in!"

There was a pause. And then with a crackle of static: "Hey."

Edward let out a sigh of relief he hadn't been aware that he had been holding back on, and gripped the side of his console. "Inform him that next time he watches where he steps, or I'll have him reamed over the coals."

"...He says he missed you."

"Ta, Big."

"Hold...Hold up. Not an accident. Was fine unitl...it dragged me down!"

There was a long silence. Then, Edward looked at Small. "You were closest. Can you tell if that's plausible?"

"...It's...possible. I haven't seen someone slide down that fast. I mean, even in water, it's not going to take you much to sink with how much weight we're packing, but it still takes time. This was...a second. Maybe more."

"Okay...do you have visual?"

Henry coughed. "Uh...it's bloody dark down here. Right, I've got something in my sights. There are...there are two in front of me. One's an ugly looking bugger. A bog-standard truck as far as I can tell...cept for the fact he's missing a tooth."

A truck, for those curious, was the nickname given to the rather odd looking creatures that had recently crawled from whatever hole such creatures lived under and started attacking humanity. They were named as such because is this really the biggest question you have thus far?

"And the other?"

"...Shit."

"What? Talk to us, Green!" Gordon patched through a visual link to Edward. He waved his arms around in bafflement. Edward raised his own hand up, gesturing to pause. "You still breathing?"

"...Yeah. No, I'm...I'm fine. It's just I'm having a hard time seeing where this thing starts or where it ends."

"Okay. Big, list a couple of the bigger ones we've faced. Maybe that way, we'll be able to pinpoint an exact size."

"Right, got it. Uh...Green, tell me if I'm warm with the size...Tarrers."

Tarrers were large creatures, larger than your garden variety truck. They spat a hor-tar like subtance everywhere, hence the name. On average, a tarrer was about the size of a tower block.

"...Cold."

"Okay...Boxers."

Boxers were more bulky. Stocky, the word was, I guess. With them, they were built like a brick, albeit a massive brick that has fists and will crush you without a thought. They, Edward reasoned, were the length of a tower block...and the width of two put together.

"...Warmer, but you're still cool."

"...Okay." Edward could see the expression on Gordon's face. He wasn't sure where to go. "All right, um...what about the Breaker?"

The Breaker was an interesting one. The others at least stood on two legs. This one was more like a tiger, albeit a tiger who was the length of seven bendy buses all in a row. It's claw had nearly killed them all several times.

"...Warm."

"...How warm?"

"Well...I think we're talking about skyscraper length here."

Edward tried very hard not to swallow audibly. The others were not so subtle. James appeared to be on the verge of freaking out completely. Percy was longingly looking in the direction from whence they had come. And the others were just standing still.

Right. Time to take control.

"Ask Green's position, Big. Now, the rest of you. We're going to have work off the assumption here that the two monsters are heading for the nearest power source. The rig. Small, Tank, I'm going to need you to try and evacuate as many people as you can and get them to safety. That's priority one. If you can move the rig, then that's even better .But lives come before costs. ...All right. Now the rest of you, assuming that Green's still in the general vicinity of where we are, we're going to have to dive down there and fight. The creatures are still quite clearly in sight of Green's current position. Any questions thus far?"

"Weapons?" Toby. Of course. Logical man.

"To be engaged the second we get to one hundred meters."

"What about calling in back up?"

"That's...not a bad idea, Small. If you can, get the Gemini's over here, fast as you can. That way, if something should happen to us down there...yeah. Anything else? ...No? Good. You got his position?"

"He's not moved at all."

"Good luck to you all. And when we get back, let's all get drunk together...dive."

...

Henry was peeved.

He had wanted to do this job to inspire people. To see if he couldn't find a way to stop hurting the envrioment. Mostly, because the idea of seeing weird and unusual creatures up close had been rather hard to ignore.

And also, the whole giant robot thing.

So, he had not expected to be stuck on a large bit of corral, sulking and looking at two rather nasty things with large teeth waiting to be rescued.

James would never let him hear the end of it.

If he lived long enough.

He tapped the communications again. "Hey, uh, Big? What's the sitch like, up there?"

"We're descending. Any update from the creatures?"

"Well...Scruffy's just sort of sitting there, and yes that's what I'm calling him...he's sitting there, doing nothing. Floating. He's occasionally looking over to his partner. He's the one with a tentacle around my leg, by the by."

"Ah."

Henry paused. "Keep the channel open, please. I...I would really appreciate some inane chatter right now."

"PAH! I could just put Small on for you if that were the case!"

But still, Gordon still kept talking. About nothing. He didn't want Henry to answer, he just plowed on. In some ways, it was a relief.

Because it was distracting Henry from the fact that he was getting colder and colder. And that was bad.

Put simply, the metal that this was made from was rather...convinient. In fact, the official name had long since been forgotten since Thomas had named it 'Pullitoutofmyarseium' back in the early days. It was really rather clever, really. It made sure that the cold didn't affect the robot, and therefore the person inside.

But there was a downside. In order to make sure that said metal didn't get affected, you had to keep moving. At least, this deep and far down in the ocean. And his trapped leg was currently stopping him from moving.

Okay, he thought. Think this through.

Problem: Cold coming in.

Solution: Move.

Problem Can't move.

Why: Creature cutting off escape passage.

Solution: Cut off the creature.

Problem: Weapons can't be activated down here.

Why: Two creatures here. Second I draw the weapon, other will notice.

Solution: Transform!

...Oh. Of course.

"Big. Listen to me. I need to transform, all right? I'll get up as far as I can, and then I'll turn around and back you up. The missiles should be able to- HOLY SHIT- HE'S MOVING TOWARDS YOU!"

Gordon snapped out of the little spiel he was in, and raised his arms in an arc. But already, the blackness that was the second creature had slammed into him. With a grunt and a cry, his comm cut out.

"Big...Big! ...GORDON! ..."

Nothing.

No, don't panic. He's tough. It's not that he's dead. More that all power's got to go to fighting that thing, including the normal power that would go towards the comms. And still the tentacle is in place.

"Okay then." Henry said to himself. "Let's do this."

And he flicked a button.

...

The journey down had been quiet. The only real chatter had been Toby course correcting them, and the occasional squeak from Gordon giving an update.

That was fine by Emily. This was the bit that was going to be fun. She was a fighter first. She was Scottish, damn it!

At last, they reached an area where Toby advised them to stop. They waited for a moment, hanging by what felt like minscule threads...for anything.

"So, Scruffy is the normal truck. What the hell do we call that thing?"

It seemed to be a shapeless mass. There was no real spine to it, no bones or anything like that. Matter of fact, it would have been called a jellyfish, were it not for the fact that jellyfish didn't have teeth that were roughly the size of Emily when she stood fully straight. She was surprised to find that she was still talking. "I say we call tha wee beastie Hector."

Edward's mech paused. And to Emily's amusement, it actually tilted it's head to the side like it's pilot as it considered this. "...Sure."

"Sure, Blue?"

"Yeah. I mean, it's a silly name, but we've all kind of named monsters at some point. Might as well get your turn in now."

"Ha! Oh come, how can ye not see it? Look at his wee face."

"...Where?"

"There...right down there! Look, the thing that's on that coral reef."

There was a pause.

"Emily...that's not it's face."

At which point, the thing with teeth lunged at Gordon. The big guy shrieked in surprise and with a jerk, he slammed his hand down on the button. "Cutting all comms!" He shouted. "Have to make sure that power's conserved!"

"GOT IT! Lads, and lass, LET'S ROLL OUT! FORMATION GAMMA!"

Formation Gamma? Things were bad then. Because Formation Gamma is something only mad men would use.

And unfortunately, there were currently four madmen at the control of four massive robots.

They all had weapons, aside from the transformation. They had come in pairs, so it was first come, first served. James and Thomas had gotten the Light Expanse, basically a really really really big flash grenade for the monsters. Henry and Toby had got the big blades, stuff that could probably slice a building in half. Gordon and Percy had grumpily taken the missiles.

And then there had been her and Edward.

"Hi."

"Hello."

There had been a pause, and then a self-conscious laugh. "We've..not spoken much, have we? More a sort of general chit-chat, group work thing."

"Yeah, pretty much."

Edward paused. "What were you hoping for?"

"A sword. One that was preferrably also a gun."

"Oooooh, nice. I have to admit, I was rather hoping I'd get some knuckledusters."

"Ah! A man after my own heart. Pity then that we're left with...claws?"

"Huh. Funny. That's not what mine says." He showed it to me. The upgrade he had would have been a mine cluster. "...Trade you?"

"What? Ye want the claws of all things? Pretty bloody useless."

"Ah. To you, they are. Because I've seen you fight up close, and trust me, you're really damn good." He pointed to his head. "See, I'm all right up here. For the most part. But it's the rest of me that's not exactly in tip top shape. I can punch things, and I can kick at them. But that's not enough. The claws at least mean I get to draw some sort of blood."

He paused. "Do you get me?"

She did. And so they had swapped.

But in retrospect she wondered if he had given her the mines because he knew that she was the one likely to do this incredibly reckless thing. Operation Gamma was simple. Those who had close range weapons (Oh, say, a massive blade or claws) would strike at the monster, sending it staggering back into something that would hopefully blind it (Say, a really really really powerful flash grenade) at which point, she'd throw her mines into it's body, and it would stumble away far enough for detonation.

So Emily waited. And it all went to plan.

Right up until the part where Hector ignored the flash completely and started swimming for Edward's robot.

"DAMN DAMN DAMN!"

...

"Hello sir, have you heard about our one true lord and savior."

"Piss off, Thomas, do you realize what time it is over in the states?"

"Not a time to be waking you up, then?"

"No it bloody well is not." The long sigh that was Duck getting his gear on got a grin from 'Tank' as he was called. "What's the prob?"

"Two monsters. Big ones. We're in the process of evacuating the Knapford Rig, would really like your help." Thomas paused, and then turned serious. "i've called both sets of twins. They'll be here backing you up."

"...Oliver's already awake. He had a feeling in his 'water' the night before. Mind, that might have been the red bull. Second we're in transit, I'll call you up."

"Fair enough. Tell Oliver to lay off that stuff, he'll be pissing like a bloody cherub if he carries on. ...Don't question it."

Thomas was not, by his nature, a big man. He was small, and he was often reminded of it. Small in stature, small in status, small in everyone's eyes. Only thing big about him, according to those he met, was his mouth. And then he had managed to get in to this program. Be a hero, they had argued. No matter what size.

No drill sergeant. Or anything like that.

He had won. By being smarter. His mouth, big as it was, had helped him with that. His cheek got under people's skin, and stayed that way until they started itching. Taking their eyes off the prize, as it was.

And then he had found out how hard being a hero was. He was bigger now. Bigger than a whole lot of people that he had met. He was bigger than anyone he had known in his life.

And he was terrified.

Course, he never let on. If you let on, you'd-

"Tank?"

"I see it, Small...all right. How do you want to do this? Missiles?"

"Can't. Backblast might take out the rest of the rig. I don't want insurance up my ass!" There was a pause. "Did that sound weird?"

"A little, yeah...okay. Blade it is."

"Take care."

"ME!? Careful! HA!"

The thing that he later learned was called Scruffy reared it's ugly head and bellowed aloud. Imagine the sound of a lion's roar mixed in with the sound of a jet engine at full speed. That was what the noise was like. Four eyes atop it's horrible head, it's body shaking and shuddering as if at any moment it was to lay eggs, it's jaws jutting out with an ungodly amount of sharp, blood encrusted teeth...

So no pressure here.

Thomas started off by going for Scruffy's eyes. He was aware that detonating the flash bang here could be very bad for everyone not inside a giant robot that had the most advanced system of protection possible. What he had to do was get the truck away from the rig, so that Percy had a clear enough shot.

Simple when said out loud.

Harder in practice.

The first swipe did nothing, apart from give Scruffy a light pat on the cheek. So Thomas went harder this time, clenching his hand into a fist and jabbing repeatedly at the ugly son of a gun. This had an effect, Scruffy screeched aloud and staggered backwards. Thomas suddenly felt like Arnold Schwazenegger. "IF IT BLEEDS-" He bellowed, raising his hands up in a cheer "-THEN WE CAN KILL IT!"

He paid the price for the quote, however. Scruffy lurched forward, ramming it's teeth directly into the chest of the robot. Thomas squawked, and tried to ignore the brief twinge in his own chest. This was...the opposite of good. What was it? Oh yes. Pants-shittingly terrifying.

In the background, he could hear Percy swearing up a storm about how he was supposed to be the idiotic one, and how Thomas was going to put him out of a job. But that wasn't what Thomas was thinking.

The primary thing that ran through his head was this:

 _Why does that thing have four eyes?_

And then it came to him.

...

Gordon had wanted to be faster. Stronger. Better than anyone else in his unit. And to some extent, that had been accomplished. Now, with this, he hit speeds that no human could ever hope to achieve.

It was just that now he was in another league entirely. Taking the big fish out of the small pond and into a lake filled with thousands of other big fishes was a rather tortured metaphor, but it worked for Gordon's feelings.

Well, there was another one for this specific moment. It involved a lack of paddles, a place in Cardiff called Shit Creek and being up it.

Hector, to use Emily's nickname for it, was incredibly stretchy. It was a bit like fighting a rubber band with teeth, except not, because it was far more complex. But as a very, very, very, very basic analogy, it worked. The part of Hector that was wrapped round the robot's body also had teeth, and was also being very, very bitey.

Gordon was running through every calculation he could think of. All right, so what couldn't he use? Missiles. This close, and he'd be likely to either blow himself up or trap him in an area where drowning was the nicest option left open to him. Okay then...no eyes. Hitting it there was a no go. No genitals, either, which was a pity. He had been kicked in that particular area often enough to know that when that happened, you didn't get back up for a good three hours at the least.

What to do? What to do?

At which point, there was a loud, squishy sort of noise, and Hector shrieked. The tentacle...didn't exactly snap off of Gordon as much as slowly deflated. He glanced out of the window and sighed.

What appeared to be a large submarine with a large spear on the end of it raced through the water, slashing madly at Hector like some sort of demented-pokey-thing. Gordon reluctantly turned the comms back on.

"-I'LL TAKE YOU TO THE SEVEN SEAS OF RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIMMMMMEEEEEE!"

"Hello, Green."

"Gordon! Nice to see you, mate! Need a hand? Or a sword, in this case?"

"Hmm...you know, I'm torn. On the one hand, you saved me and in a very impressive way too. On the other, you look like an prat."

"Oh, where's your sense of adventure?!"

"Back at base, in a padlocked box with the words 'SENSE OF ADVENTURE' written on it." Gordon paused, and then realized that at this point, maintaining a calm attitude was not getting him anywhere. "Oh screw it!" He reached out and grabbed the submarine. "Ready?!"

"Ready!"

"EN GARDE, YOU BLACK ARSEHOLE!"

He paused.

"That...That wasn't a race thing! It was just...You know what, forget it."

...

"Guys?"

"Yes?"

"Overlooking the fact that Blue is fighting for his life against some great big horrible thing for a moment, can we just appreciate that we're watching a massive robot using a submarine with a blade on the end like a musketeer...underwater?"

"Yes, Red. Yes we can."

"NOT FOR TOO LONG, I HOPE!" snapped Edward.

"Just...one second more...okay, and we're done." James snapped back into professional mode. "All right...so...can we open a channel up to them up there?"

"I think so? Hold on, give me a second...and we're through. Hi, Small, how's it going?"

"Um...well, I mean, we've managed to get the majority of people out." Percy sounded a strange mixture of frustrated and concerned. "But at the moment, we're still waiting for all three Gemini guys to arrive. And Tank is currently getting his arse kicked by the truck."

"We call him Scruffy."

"Oh. Right. Hang on, maybe I can get my own connection through-"

"AAAAAAARGH! SOMEONE STOP THE RIDE I WANNA GET OFF! ABUBBUBUBUBUBUBUB-"

"Well, he sounds like he's having a blast."

"Literally." There was a loud explosion, and then a roar of agony. "And that's the first of my missiles fired off...oh shit it's coming for me! Tank, if you've found anything useful out, HURRY THE HELL UP!"

At which point, Percy's feed cut out. As they waited for Thomas to stop breathing so heavily, James and Toby chanced a look towards Edward, who was currently doing the only thing he could do. Headbutting Hector.

"All...All right, I've got something!"

"Great! is it another cold? Because if so, I've barely just recovered from that last one-"

"I mean about the monster! Listen, this...this truck up here has two more eyes than normal. Now, normally, I'd say that was down to just freak luck. And then I caught word from the comms channel that your beastie down there has...no eyes at all. Is that correct?"

"Aye!"

"So...what if it's like a seeing eye dog?"

There was silence for a moment. "That'd explain a lot." Edward remarked, taking an oppurtunity to run away from Hector and ponder his next move. "We tried to blind the thing, but it just ignored it. Like...Like it wasn't even affected!"

"And I know that it's not exactly uncommon, but the thing was really sensitive about it's eyes. So, if we take out Scruffball over here-"

"Maybe we can neutralize Hector as well!" Toby grinned. "For a small bastard, you can be awfully smart!"

"HEY!"

"Okay, so...new plan." Edward lashed out with a powerful right hook, knocking away Hector again for a brief moment. "Percy, kill and/or blind that sucker. At which point, Emily, you're going to have use every last mine to blast Hector. The rest of you! Slash, shoot, do whatever you can!"

The dropping of codewords was a significant thing. In this chaos, it was clear that the lot of them needed to work together like a well oiled machine.

Well, there was a first time for everything.

...

Percy jumped back and forth, antsily waiting for a chance for Thomas to get a move on. He got his wish as Thomas practically jumped up into the air, holding Scruffy in what appeared to be a Full Nelson. Percy had never before seen a robot and a monster have a wrestling competition, but today had been pretty weird all around.

Carefully he took aim once more. But before he could fire upon Scruffy, the truck lashed out and caught Thomas right on the nose. With a scream, it wrapped itself around the robot, squeezing tightly like a boa constrictor.

Suddenly, there was a blurr, and the monster screamed again, this time in pain. Percy whooped in delight, as the Gemini's (Large battleships on the same level as the robots, save for the linkage of two pilots to each one) sailed into view, all guns blazing. Literally, as Scruffy was shot again and again, forcing himself to back away from Thomas.

Which gave him a clear shot.

The first missile slammed into Scruffy's eyes. The second into it's gut. It was the work of a moment to rush up and deliver the hardest punch that Percy could. The result: One decapitated truck.

Thomas couldn't see this, of course. He had been dragged out of his rapidly dying machine to the relative safety of a medical bay bed.

...

The reaction of Hector was immediately notable. Everyone down at the sea bed could instantly tell the moment that Scruffy had died. The second that the smaller creature had died, Hector suddenly froze, as if suddenly aware of the darkness of the sea. It thrashed about even more so than usual, but there was no sort of co-ordination to the attack any more.

"Okay!" snapped Toby. "We've blinded it! ...Now what?"

"A good question, Tram! ...Anyone got any bright ideas?"

Gordon paused in the midst of his slashing attack, and as he checked on Henry (Who was feeling queasy) he typed a few words into the computer bank.

BLOW IT THE F**K UP.

"Why is he using asterisks? We all know what he means."

"The world may never know, Stirling." Edward groaned. "Okay then, big shot, how many mines do we have left?"

"A FUCKTON!"

"Thank you, Stirling, for reminding me why you're so valuable! ...Right, we're going to have to lure it somehow out to a relatively quiet section of the water." He quickly glanced at a digital map on his screen, as he began to hit at it again and again. "Okay...right, marking location! Stirling, launch the mines to the exact latitude and longitude of my co-ordinates!" As he waited Edward wondered to himself it was meant to be. Perhaps this was it. The moment he laid down his life for his fellow-

"Toby's got it now!"

...Then again, perhaps not. "TRAM! Get back here!"

"No can do!" Toby's blade had gone right through one of the many mouths the creature had, and slowly but surely, he was dragging it towards the cluster of mines. "Might as well get it over with!"

"YOU ARE NOT DYING TODAY!"

"I should bloody well hope not! If I do, I shall come back and haunt you all!" There was a jovial tone, but also just a hint of fear embedded in Toby's words.

...

Hector was writhing, it's mouths biting and grinding and ripping at the robot's body. Toby prayed to god that he was close.

Five feet away, he realized that the water had begun to come in. Just small leaks at first.

Four feet, the creature nearly smashed it's way into the control room.

Three feet, a small puddle gathered at his feet.

Two feet, the leaks got bigger and bigger.

One foot, he didn't care anymore.

And then...

.

.

.

.

"-come on you bastard, don't you die on me?!"

"You got him here straight away?!"

"As fast as we could, Victor!"

"Shit shit shit..."

After that, silence for a moment. It took Toby a great deal of effort, but he forced his eyes open, and gazed up into the face of-

"Bloody hell, if you're an angel, you can send me back to the other place."

"Cheeky devil!" James thwacked him on the shoulder. Toby wailed. "Oh...OH, sorry, forgot there for a second. So, when you're feeling better, Edward's going to chew you out for doing such a stupid thing. And then give you a few medals for bravery. And then-"

"So...I was thinking. Maybe we could make a few adjustments to the cartoon?"

...

IN A WORLD WHERE WE ARE WAR WITH EACH OTHER, AND THE CREATURES FROM THE DEPTH TAKE ADVANTAGE OF IT...

THERE IS ONLY!

ONE!

MAN!

WHO CAN STOP THE RISING APOCALYPSE!

TOBIAS! DEFENDER OF ALL THAT IS RIGHT!

...

James beamed. "Sooooo, what do you think?"

"A TRIUMPH!" Toby cheered.

The remaining six smacked themselves in the face.


	14. In Which Christmas Is RuinedAgain

_Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the rails_  
 _Not an engine was stirring, despite their many fails-_

All right, sod it, we're not doing another bloody rhyming one again.

Okay, it was the morning of Christmas Eve, whereupon the engines were required to arrive by noon for afternoon tea at the Duke and Duchess's summer house, which was in the middle of winter. Confused yet? Good!

"This is ruddy hopeless!" snarled Henry as he and Gordon took turns to plough through the snow on the main line. "We should have taken a right at that junction, but OHHHHH no, we had to cut across here so that we could show Spencer who the boss is- SHIT A BRICK!" He screamed as he hit a log with full force.

"Shit a brick isn't an engine, Henry." came a rather snide remark from behind the big green engine. Emily was bloody lucky she was behind him, or else he would have given her a right rant. Or so he told himself as he tried to exorcise the intense agony flowing through his buffers. "Sides, ye cannae leave all the blame ta him! Who's the daft tosser who decided to nae wear his snowplough?!"

"I know!" agreed Thomas, who was coupled up behind so as not to waste more coal. "What an idiot."

"You shut the hell up!" hissed Henry, who was beginning to regret ever opening his eyes. "Hypocritical little- Edward, you're awfully quiet!"

"Something that you should be from time to time." sighed the blue mixed traffic engine, as he and Toby idled along behind Gordon, currently enjoying the 'Educating Henry' hour to it's fullest. "I want to get back to the sheds and sleep."

"Not a Christmas fan, are ye?"

"I am! Actually! ...Ever since we've stopped calling it Winter Bloody Holidays, it's been great. Problem is, I'm getting bushed and I would like to be able to enjoy it on the day itself. As opposed to the three months worth of advertisement we've been getting. I swear, the royal bloody wedding had less build up than this."

"To be fair, what else do we have?" James let out a braying laugh. "Unless you want to see yet another celebration of 'Let's Dance Around the Flaming Tire Pile' this year."

"Sad thing was, in Depression times, that was actually fun."

"Dark days indeed." Percy said gravely.

"Here we are." Toby sighed in relief. He too wanted to sod off and go to sleep. The eight arrived at the manor house just in time to see both Hatt and the Duke throw down with each other. It was a dark, brutal, gritty, knuckles to teeth kind of fight.

Or at least it was in another universe. In this one, it was a bit like watching a slightly past it seal face off against a perpetually stunned looking Bertie Wooster mannequin. At last, Hatt landed the finishing blow (A light shove that might have well have been dropping a ton of bricks on the Duke's head, given how he reacted) and staggered down to the platform.

"Aye! Well...oh god, that shows you, doesn't it...oh goodness...hold on, give me a moment to catch my breath back." He staggered backwards and collapsed into a deck chair the gardener had forgotten to put away. The moment quickly turned into moments, and then into a good three hours of desperate attempts to get his breathing back, while the eight engines looked at each other in an uncomfortable silence.

"Right...right...what are you eight doing here again?"

"You asked us to come here!" Gordon snapped. Spencer had passed through an hour or so ago and gloated in his usual fashion.

"And so I did! Er...right. I just wanted to wish you a very merry Christmas!"

The deck chair finally gave up the ghost and shattered into pieces.

"So why couldn't you just come to the sheds and do what you normally do?"

"Good idea, Thomas, glad I thought of it! Now, off with you!"

...

"Can't believe he dragged us all the way out for that!" James hissed, as he and Percy cut back across a rather shorter path to the sheds. The others were staying behind to make sure that Fatty's arse were not embedded with splinters, but James was in no mood to do anything other than sleep.

By now, it was getting dark, and as the two engines crossed into the Whispering Wood, they saw a red light in the distance.

"Duck's meant to be here with the Kipper." recalled Percy after a moment of puzzling over it.

"Must be his brake-van...I'm going to make him jump!"

"That is an awful idea, James."

"Yes. And?"

"...Really stupid?"

"Come on! It'll be funny!" James accelerated, not enough to seriously crush the brake-van, but enough so that the bump would be felt along the train.

Percy gave a cheery whistle as Duck passed by seconds later.

And then the obvious thought passed through his mind. If that was Duck just now, then who the hell is-

"JAMES WAIT!"

There was not, to Percy's relief, a sound like the crunching of wood and the screaming of humans as James hit the source of the light hard.

There was, however, a screech of a rather baffled reindeer, and then a rather loud thump as his body flew up into the air and hit the side of the rails with a rather final 'snap'. The red light promptly went out.

James and Percy stopped. And they looked at each other.

Then they started to scream.

...

"Where the tinsel is Rudolph!?" Father Christmas was getting panicked and perhaps, just a bit, a wee bit miffed.

"Probably gone off somewhere, fat man!" snarled Donner. He slammed his hooves together. "He probably got sick of having to guide the sleight tonight with his nose oh so perishingly bright!"

"This wouldn't have happened if we had just put headlights on." muttered Dasher, rebelliously.

"But they go so poorly with this outfit!" whined Dancer. "It's cute, isn't that right, elf?!"

"Yeah, elf! Tell us how cute our outfits are!" Prancer declared. Vixen and Comet wondered if it was possible for a reindeer to commit suicide. They didn't want to try just yet, however. For all they knew it could be very painful indeed.

"I HAVE A NAME YOU KNOW."

"No one cares, treacle!" snapped Danny Dyer in reindeer form. I mean, Blitzen. Contrary to popular opinion he was not German. No, that honour belonged to-

"JOLLY MAN! WE MUST MOVE IT, AS SOON AS POSSIBLE!" Cupid, contrary to his name, was a big burly reindeer in the vein of Arnold Schwarzenegger. If...you know...he was an animal. No one had laughed at his name since Johnny.

Who was Johnny?

Exactly.

"What do you think, Vixen?"

"Well, I-"

"NO ONE CARES WHAT YA VIXEN THINKS!" bellowed Cupid. "WE MUST GET TO THA CHOPPAH! I mean SLEIGH."

Father Christmas chose Sodor as the starting point for his trek around the world every year, it must be noted, primarily due to the nature of the Island as being unpredictable, and that was being generous. So it was mostly done first to get out of the way before the easier areas, such as war torn or sickness stricken countries, could be tackled.

Unfortunately, they had come down due to a bad cold, and as such, had lost sight of Rudolph. But as they took to the sky, he was confident that they could manage it even without their cash-reindeer.

As they reached up into the sky, Jeremy the Jet Plane ambled over. He was carrying no passengers and was looking forward to knocking off for the night, and indeed for the next three or four days. He had no way of spotting the sleight until it was too late.

Seven reindeer and one sleigh cleared the jet plane without any bother.

One elf and one reindeer, however, did not.

As Jeremy crashed down into the nearby woods, Father Christmas struggled for control, and the seven reindeer tried not to vomit at the sight of Donner's headless body weighing the sleigh down.

This was, you can imagine then, the worst possible time for a group of known idiots to do whatever it was that they did.

Unfortunately, that time was now.

...

"So...fireworks?"

"FIREWORKS!" agreed Gordon with a forced attempt at jovial cheer. "This shall be the cherry upon the Christmas Cake! Will it not, Henry?"

"I want to die."

"KEEP THAT CHEER A-COMING!"

"This seems like a bad idea." said Edward, who was already beginning to slip off into the land of nod. "Can't it wait until next year?"

"Nope!"

Toby made sure to move well away from the potential fire hazard. He thanked the lord that Percy wasn't here. He hoped he was somewhere safe. And certainly not burying a corpse anywhere, hahahahaha-

The first firework shot up into the air. For a moment, the six remaining engines waited for the inevitable big bang that emitted.

They promptly heard one human shriek and seven animals scream in unison.

At which point, the smell of burnt reindeer could be felt upon their noses, a large sleigh crashed into the goods shed where it promptly blew up, and Father Christmas landed on the Tidmouth roof with a sickening crack.

There was a long silence.

"WE'RE GOING TO HELL!" screamed Thomas.

And pandemonium reigned.

...

About an hour later, Carlin was awoken by someone throwing snow at his window. "The f**k!?" He groaned, as he staggered out of bed, tripped over his cat and staggered over to shove the window open. "OI! DO YOU KNOW WHAT TIME IT IS?!"

"Do you!?"

"Don't get smart with me! ...Henry, what are you doing up at this hour?!"

"Well...ah heh, would you believe that we...might have...accidentally...destroyed Christmas?"

"...Wait there. I'll get my coat."

"The ambulance just took Father Christmas to the hospital. They're not sure whether or not he's going to make it. We've got three reindeer who are alive, and another four who are...sort of scattered all over the Tidmouth area." Henry swallowed. "It was...quite terrifying."

"Ah well. At least it'll give the kids something to look for next Easter. And you need me because?"

"Well you know how in the shop, when you break something, you have to pay for it?"

"I don't like where this is going-"

"YOU'RE THE NEW FATHER CHRISTMAS!"

"...F**k you."

"No, I'm deadly serious. Apparently we've only got to worry about Britain for the most part, the rest of the world's being handled by the other Santas- Long story- so we've just got to cover the entire continent in...I don't know, seven, eight hours."

"But why me?!"

"Because if the little ones wake up, they're going to see someone going down the chimney, and that might as well be someone who looks a fraction like the old man who is currently in hospital having most of his bones put back into place."

"...Okay, but why-?"

"BECAUSE HATT SAID SO!"

...

"This is all James's fault somehow." muttered Gordon as he was coupled onto the makeshift sleigh. It was an old open-topped carriage that they had nicked from the Small Railway out of desperation.

"Said the engine who killed the reindeer."

"Shut up Toby."

"Why do I have to go? You can just get Duck, I'll probably knock myself out just by going at a slow canter!" Toby's question was not answered. He was coupled at the front of the makeshift train on the left side, with Thomas on the right. Behind them, respectively, were Emily and Percy, then behind them were James and Edward, and behind THEM followed Henry and Gordon. All of them were tied together using a similar harness to the one the reindeer had been wearing.

"So how are we going to fly this?" asked Carlin, wearing the world's thinnest Santa Claus outfit.

"Magic!" said the Fat Controller, dropping the massive sack onto the carriage and nearly tipping the American out like a seesaw. "Figured it out as we were gathering together. The sack is the only thing magically in the sleigh to make it any different from another of it's kind. UP UP AND AWAY!"

"...That's not a reason to-"

"UP. UP. AND AWAY."

The engines looked at each other.

"All right." said Emily, cautiously. "Start off?"

Slowly, Thomas and Toby started. Their movement helped tighten the reins, and Percy and Emily picked up speed. The same happened for the next pair, and the next, and then the coach itself began to slowly grind along the rails sideways. It was not, it must be said, a particularly nice sound and Carlin's expression indicated that he would rather die than deal with this right now.

"All right, we've got enough speed!" shouted Gordon.

"Andddddd UP!"

"UP!"

"AND AWA-"

...

Once they had pulled Thomas and Toby out of the large brick wall they had run into, Hatt and his bodyguards hurried into the woods to find where Rudolph was buried in the hope that the inevitable dissection would give them a reason for how to fly.

"PIXIE DUST!?"

"Pixie dust." said Hatt, who was just as pissed as Edward. "Apparently."

"Oh no." sighed Emily. "If we dinnae do this, then Christmas will be ruined!"

"...It really won't."

"It will!"

"You remember last year, right? That whole gather around the tree thing and sing really really loud into guilt tripping Diesel into returning our presents. That was fun. Why don't we just do it again?"

"LET ME HAVE MY NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS MOMENT!" shouted Thomas.

And then they tried again. And much to their surprise, pixie dust was the answer. Now, as soon as they found out what the question was, then they'd really be moving.

...

I'd like to take a moment here to discuss the Barrow St Andreas Church that was located just a little bit away from the coastal seaside station that was used as the starting point for what we term 'Mainland'.

This fine church was officially created from the ground up when the Normans invaded and took England for their own, and for the most part survived the various wars that happened with nary a scratch.

"WE'RE WALKING IN THE AIR! THE COLD WIND'S BEGINNING TO LASH! WE'RE OFF TO SAVE CHRISTMAS- OH DEAR GOD WE'RE GOING TO CRASH!"

Shame then that eight engines couldn't steer in mid air and promptly took out the bell tower completely.

"Rats." said Percy, who had been the one singing. "Who put that there?!" The remaining seven engines were quite glad that the caterwauling had been shut up, even if the fashion in which it was done left much to be desired.

"All right, what exactly is our plan of action?" asked Edward, as Carlin tried futilely to pile the stones back in the general order in which they were built. "Alphabetically or street by street?"

"Please tell me we've got a list!" whimpered Henry, who had taken a nasty blow to the buffer.

"Of course he has a list! He was checking it twice! Now to find out who is naughty or-"

"SHUT UP."

"All right, all right, chill! ...HA! Chill!"

"...We're going to die here." Edward whispered, more to himself than anything. Eventually, Carlin realized that the church tower was down for good and pulled out a rather battered list of every single person in the area they were supposed to deliver to.

As you can imagine, there were a lot of people.

Eventually a system was decided upon that they would do things by area. The magical sack was very helpful in that regard, smacking Carlin upside the head every time they were finished.

In retrospect, it should have done that after Carlin had gotten out of the chimney, and not halfway up it.

All across the country, similar things happened. We would be here

...

Big Ben had been closed for repairs for most of the year. However, the builders had retreated back down to the bottom of the tower, so that on this, Christmas Day, the bell could be rung.

BONG, went the bell. And everyone sighed happily.

BONG, went the bell. And everyone was a little less happy but still pretty happy.

CRUNCH, went Thomas as he ploughed into the bell.

"OOOOOOOOH." went the crowd.

"Oh that's coming out of my paycheck." went Carlin. He slowly began to back the sleigh out, with every movement cauing intense pain to the engines at the front. He then dropped the sack on the head of a nearby citizen, and was forced to climb down Big Ben in order to save Christmas and the man's life. In that order.

As they hurried across to practically throw presents through the windows, they hoped things would be better at the palace.

Emily laughed until she choked as Gordon, fastest and best and puller of the express, ran like the devil from an army of tiny and adorable corgis. Meanwhile, as Carlin attempted to drop off presents for little George and Charlotte (Forgetting that they wouldn't be in the area he was putting them in), he was promptly beaten down by a sleep-deprived Prince Phillip into retreating.

Alternatively, it was just Prince Phillip wide awake having gotten a full night of sleep the night before. He's one of those people.

And that was just the start of their night.

 _ **TUNE IN NEXT TIME TO SEE HOW CARLIN WILL SCREW THIS UP EVEN MORE.**_


End file.
